This posting originally appeared on the Mesa Verde UMC Facebook page. Please leave your questions or comments there.

I was asked how I defend not taking the Bible literally. Frankly, I take the Bible too seriously and love it too dearly to take it literally. But I do have to watch myself on this issue because I can get too carried away and hurt people’s feelings by seeming to make fun of them in my passion.

No one really ever takes the Bible literally. We all know that when Jesus says, “I am the door,” he doesn’t mean he is an actual door. Or when John the Baptist says about Jesus, “Behold the Lamb of God,” that Jesus suddenly becomes a cute cuddly lamb.

What Christians mean when they say they take the Bible literally is that the Bible is the only true source for faith and doctrine, and that God inspired the writers to copy or to write precisely what God said.

But there are just a few problems with this approach.

First, God is bigger than the Bible. I suspect many of us have experienced God in the wilds of nature or in a moment of deep sorrow or crisis. These personal moments shape our faith and reveal to us pieces of God’s character. The traditional protestant words about the Bible are that it contains sufficient inspiration for our salvation. But nowhere does it contain exclusive inspiration. The Holy Spirit is loose in the world, and divine moments happen all the time. So the Bible may not be the only true source for faith and doctrine for many.

Second, the Bible’s authority was not grounded in its literalism until the 1870s. Certain Christians believed that reason and rationality would undermine the biblical authority. So they argued that the Bible was literally given to us by God and was, therefore, unassailable by reason.

But the Bible has been in written form since 500 BCE. It has been inspiring Jews and Christians for 2500 years without being literal. In other words, literalism is not needed for communication and inspiration from God. In fact, one of the very first great Christina theologians—Origin—argued that the Bible could be read several way— historically, morally, liturgically, and allegorically.  The Jewish Talmud, a sacred commentary on the Bible written by rabbis, declares there are the meanings of the word, meanings of the sentence, and meanings behind both.

Third, there are literally thousands of manuscripts, fragments, and biblical quotations from the early Christian era. These show a pattern of collating, editing, debating, and ultimately voting on the books of the Bible. I believe God inspired the process, but it was not as simple as copying and passing it together.

The real problem with literalism, however (its great heresy, if you will), is that it treats the Bible as a book. It’s not a book. It’s a doorway disguised as a book. For example, the purpose of the Gospel of Mark is not to provide information about Jesus or to find out his moral guidelines. The purpose is to meet Jesus. The purpose is to have a spiritual encounter with him through the text. If the Bible is just another book—even a holy book, it’s worthless. The authority is not in the text or the words or in it being sanctioned by the church. The authority is that we when we read it, we encounter the Divine.

I believe the Bible is made up of the words of God, but Jesus is the Word of God. It is the Word of God that makes the words of God come alive and real and redemptive.

I am not opposed to literalism. I think literalism can give us valuable spiritual insights. But I believe it’s only one layer of biblical meaning. My image is the Grand Canyon. The canyon is comprised of layers. A mile of layers. Each layer has its own name, own history, own beauty. I think biblical interpretation has layers too. The fundamental mistake people make is to assume the layer they explore, and in which they discover God, is the only layer or the best layer or the most meaningful layer. They are wrong. 

The Bible should be best understood as a memory book. Jan recently made a memory book from our trip to New York. She blended pictures, stories, backgrounds, and designs into a book that tells the story of our trip. It did not include all the photos. It did not include all the stories. It did not include everything we saw or did or ate or learned. But anyone who looks at and reads the memory book knows and shares the feelings of our trip.

I think the Bible is a memory book of Israel’s faith journey with God and the Disciples’ adventures with Jesus. When we read the Bible, we relive their journey and adventure. We become Israel and the Disciples. Their journey becomes our journey, their God becomes our God; and just as God met them on the journey, so God meets us on ours.

Recently a group of atheists met at the Huntington Beach pier to tear pages from the Bible as a protest against street preachers who preach at the pier. I was offended that anyone would ever believe that any good thing could ever come from destroying a book. I was surprised rational atheists would make such an emotional decision. I am strongly opposed to book burning, book tearing, and book damaging.

But they also showed they do not understand how the Bible is sacred. The Bible is not sacred simply because it is the church’s book. The Bible is sacred because the stories in it help us to open ourselves to the Holy Spirit. This is the real power and authority of scripture, that the living God meets us there in every story, every saying, and every text.

And that, literally, is something you can’t tear up or throw away, no matter how hard you try.

This posting originally appeared on the Mesa Verde UMC Facebook page. Please leave your questions or comments there.

The Meaning of the Beatitudes

Someone asked about the meaning of the Beatitudes. The Beatitudes are the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount. They are 12 verses found in Matthew 5. I think they are often overlooked or breezed through. But I think they are some of the most critical verses in the Bible. To really understand them, we have to go back to the Old Testament, go back to Exodus 20, go back to the Ten Commandments.

For many Christians, the Ten Commandments are a list of ethical requirements. The first one is, “You shall have no other gods before me.” Numero Uno. The first one. But we have missed the point. The problem with starting with number uno, number one, is that it makes the assumption that if we live by these ten, then we will be saved. Following the Christian code of conduct gets us into God’s good graces. But it doesn’t.

The chapter containing the Ten Commandments begins with an extra verse; “I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land the slavery, out of the land of bondage.” Then it continues: “You shall no other gods before me.” In other words, God has already saved Israel before God gives them the Ten Commandments. The Ten Commandments are ways to keep the grace and salvation within the community that is already saved and redeemed and chosen. God saves Israel and us before we can do any ethical good works. Salvation is a God thing; ethics and the moral life are our response to being saved.

Jump back to the Beatitudes. These are Jesus’ words of affirmation, declaring that the disciples are already saved—before they get the list of ethics in the Sermon on the Mount. Look up the Beatitudes.  They are all in the present verb tense. “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are the merciful for they shall receive mercy.” The blessing is not a future event. The blessing is not on the other side of the pearly gates. It’s now. Blessed are you!

I think Jesus wants us to know that before we try to live the Christian life, we are already part of the Christian family. We have already received every grace necessary to our salvation. Jesus is saying, “You are now part of my family, you are my beloved, so I need you to make a difference in the world. You are the ambassadors of God’s Kingdom.” We are to represent Christ. We are Christ’s representatives on this planet we call earth. But this idea only works if we already know that we are citizens of God’s kingdom. The Beatitudes are the guarantee of our citizenship. Ours is the Kingdom of Heaven.

This posting originally appeared on the Mesa Verde UMC Facebook page. Please leave your questions or comments there.

What is Hell?

A place you do not want to go to! A place that makes Death Valley seem like Fargo in the winter! A place where bad people go when they die and are made to suffer by even worse people. A place where Satan calls home. The place where all (fill in the blank) people go. A place where all those who do not believe in Jesus will end up.

These are some popular definitions. Mostly wrong, is my guess. The truth is, neither Jesus nor any book of the Bible spends much time thinking about hell (often called Sheol in the Old Testament) Of course, they didn’t talk much about heaven, either. The biblical idea is that God is alive and well and running around our world now, and if we pay too much attention to either heaven or hell we will miss God in the present.

But in the Dark Ages and in medieval Europe, when the entire government was structured by class—from kings to dukes to serfs—it was easy to imagine heaven had a hierarchy, as well. And if heaven had a hierarchy does that mean hell had one too? (Or is this a “lowerarchy”?) 

In the 1200s, Dante gave visual word pictures of the tortures of hell, and hell became a very powerful recruiting technique. Scared out of hell into the promised land. Hell became the place for unrepentant sinners—usually people you didn’t like or theultimate destination for groups society didn’t. “Flee from the wrath to come” became the preaching cry.

Often missed is the line in the earliest church creed—the Apostles Creed. It declares that Jesus went to Hell. What? Check it out. Look up the Apostles Creed. Certain denominations changed the language to read he descended to the dead. John Wesley left the line out for Methodists entirely because he didn’t want church folks saying the word hell. Wesley was wrong on this point. I think it’s harder to avoid going there if you can’t even say the name!

But why would Jesus go to hell? One reason might be that are people tell Jesus to go to hell all the time, and Jesus can say. “Been there. Done that!” Seriously, he went to save them just as he had a ministry on earth to save us. Here’s how I think it works, at least in my imagination.

We were created in God’s image. We are still not sure exactly what that means, but at the least it means we have the ability to love. The ability to love requires both the power of choice and the ability to choose not to love. You probably have noticed that we human beings have an amazing ability to act in our own worse interest, to intentionally choose to do the things which harm us and to keep on choosing badly. But God is gracious all the time.

So when we die, we all go to heaven. God’s desire, of course, is to save everyone; God welcomes everyone to their true home. (Check out Titus 2:11) But if you have been behaving badly all your life, is it likely you will suddenly stop? God hopes you will. God loves and welcomes even the worse of us.

But heaven isn’t set up for people who insist on doing everything their own way or for those who insist on hanging on to being mean. Imagine if heaven was like a baseball game. Everyone gets to play. Everyone is on the team. But if someone only lives by the rules of football, they won’t ever fit in. There is no place for them in heaven.

Hell is the place where people go who still, even after death, don’t want to accept God’s grace and welcome and still want to play by their rules only. And if hell is really filled with those kinds of people, it is truly a very, very nasty place. It’s a real hell.

But Jesus went there and still goes there to declare that God always has the last word. There is always hope, always a way back home. Grace operates even in hell itself because, after all, that’s what grace is all about. God is gracious all the time.

This posting originally appeared on the Mesa Verde UMC Facebook page. Please leave your questions or comments there.

Someone asked the question, “Can you please guide us in the use of judgment about others?” For Christians, the place to look is Jesus’ words in the Sermon on the Mount. Matthew 7:

“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?  How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye?  You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.
“Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs. If you do, they may trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces. (NIV)

We remember the opening line which tells us not to judge anyone. And there is good reason to follow this command. People don’t often tell us either their intentions or the motivations behind their actions. Nor do we know all their history. For example, does it make a difference if we learn that that an angry, bitter person has been the victim of systematic abuse?

One of my professors once pointed out there is a huge problem with this passage. I am sure you have noticed. The first half of Verse 1 commands no judging, but the rest of the passage offers advice on how to judge! The way you judge others is the way you will be judged. This feels like a warning and a principle. And certainly there is no hesitancy in judgment on the last verse. My interpretation would be something like:

“Some people are theological idiots, so don’t get into theological discussions with them because they won’t understand you, and they will attack you because they think you are being condescending.”

So why does Jesus tell us not to judge, and yet give us principles for how to judge? My professor—Hans Dieter Betz—offered these ideas. These are Kingdom Ethics, he said. The way we are to act in when we’re in God’s Kingdom. Judgment is God’s domain. We can care for people without making moral judgments about them. This is indeed a good way to live. This is God’s desire for us. We get to do what God already does for each person—care deeply even when the person goes bad, or wrong, or off the deep end.

But we are also not living in the Kingdom of God yet. Not everyone is following the Kingdom Ethics. We live in a broken world. So how do we live out Kingdom Ethics in a non kingdom world? This is why Jesus provides the rest of the verse. Study the verses yourself. Here’s what I think they say:

The way you treat people directly effects how others treat you. How you relate to others is the mirror of how they relate to you. Judge people without compassion and you will receive no compassion. Measure out harshness and brutal legality; do not expect forgiveness to be extended to you. Consider your own brokenness before you accuse others of their brokenness. Judgment begins with a realistic awareness of our own failings and limits. And consider your audience—their history and identity—in how you make every judgment.

I think this does allow for Christians to be judges and to offer judgments. But it’s not easy and never taken lightly.
In my spiritual journey, I have found Jan’s Rule to be very helpful. Because you love someone, and want the best for them, you have the right to tell them how you feel about what they are doing.

But you have to do it in a loving manner.

And only once.

Then you can’t mention it again unless they begin to mess up again. (Are you sorry you asked this question?)

I have also found Wesley’s rules to be a great source of strength.

First, do no harm.

Second, do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, in all the times you can, as long as you can.

Third, stay in love with God.

This posting originally appeared on the Mesa Verde UMC Facebook page. Please leave your questions or comments there.

Stump Mark Returns

I am not sure about this Facebook thing. My life seems too scattered to record. Besides, do people really care about what I had for breakfast and the theological value of granola or donuts? (Donuts have holes; does that make them holy?)

But I do realize that I have been doing a form of facebooking for over 20 years. It started with a San Diego elementary camp. The camp had failed spiritually and fiscally for years. My wife Jan (who is also a minister) and I took it over for three years. In year one, we invited a professor of Old Testament and Preaching to be with us. His name was John Holbert.

He offered a time when the kids could ask him all kind of biblical questions. “Why doesn’t the creation story mention dinosaurs? What was the light that God made on day one if there wasn’t any sun until day four?” Kids notice stuff like that. So the next year, John couldn’t be with us. The kids wanted someone to step into the role of theological answer man, and “Stump Mark” was born.

I have been answering theological questions ever since. Well, not just theological questions. But all kinds of questions, though I confess my answers tend to have a theological spin to them. What I have found is that most questions are both informational and relational. There is a lack of real historical info about why we do things, but there is a deeper and sometime far more ominous reason the questions are asked.

And sometimes my answer is that I don’t have an answer or certainly not the for-sure-absolutely-right answer. As Jan has said many times; sometimes there are no right or wrong choices, but the choices are made right or wrong by how we live out the choices we make. (Wise Woman! Maybe she should be writing this stuff!) And, yes, there are silly and even stupid questions because sometimes we are silly and stupid. So I give a silly and stupid answer.

But there is real power is asking the questions and in having someone try to answer them. Sometimes it’s just enough to ask the question you have been holding on to for years. So this year I will be trying to answer your questions via Facebook. I will give it my best shot.
 

The church was born on a feast day. Pentecost was a Jewish festival.  It was called the Festival of the Weeks. Pentecost commemorated God giving the Torah, the Scripture, to the people of Israel. Pentecost for Christians was marked not by the giving of new laws or rules, but by the giving of the Spirit. Each follower of Christ receives a share of the Holy Spirit for the task of building up the church.

Thursday was the Day of Ascension; the day when Jesus leaves earth and returns to heaven. Traditionally, the Day of Ascension happened 40 days after Easter, and occurred on the Mount of Olives. Although Methodists do not pay much attention to the Day of Ascension, the Orthodox Church believes it completes the Easter Story. Jesus ascends from the place he was arrested to heaven. The theology of Ascension Day adds two interesting ideas: that Jesus’ humanity is now part of the Trinity, and that redeemed humanity is higher level than created humanity. The Ascension story ends with the Angels telling the disciples; Why are you looking at heaven? Get back to work! This is the part that Methodists claim.

Easter is not about theology; Easter is about witness. The common theme is, “What we have seen, we now declare to you.” (1 John: 1-2). Easter is grounded in the experience of the Risen Lord. Theology is a shortcut that summarizes the collection of Easter experiences. Faith is the trusting of that experience. Doubter, seekers, and questioners are all welcomed and encouraged. Just look at the story of Doubting Thomas (John 20: 19-31). Ask yourself: What do these stories tell us about the Risen Lord? How do these stories provide us clues about having our own Easter experience?

All the Gospels are written backwards. They should have started with the punch line—Jesus is Risen from the dead! If there had been no resurrection, there would have been no gospel. The Easter story is the central Christian story. Every other story is the lead in, or a warm up act, or the setup to what comes next. Easter is not just any event, it is The Event. And if He rose, then He is still Risen. If He is Risen, He is with us today. So on Easter we are not just celebrating a historical event, but a current experience. Easter happens again. He is Risen!

One of my Easter joys is driving to church for the Sunrise Service. It’s dark. There is no one on the road. Last year I was the only person driving on the 405! It was straight out of twilight zone! It’s strange but it does give the feel that something dramatic, overwhelming, and definitely not normal has happened. In small ways, I am reliving Easter by traveling in the dark.

If you think about it, the entire Easter story is about things happening in the dark. Judas and the soldiers come to arrest Jesus in the dark. The garden of Gethsemane is in the valley. Jesus would have seen their torch lights as they came down the hill for him. The kiss of betrayal, and the subsequent trials happened at night. Three days later the women traveled the same road down from the city by torch light. He didn’t see them coming because he was wrapped in an even greater darkness.

The early Church believed that Jesus did not, however, simply lie dead in the dark during those three days. They believed he travelled to hell, or sheol as it is called in the Hebrew scriptures.

Sheol was not the place of creative tortures—Christians developed that version of hell in the Middle Ages. But it was a place of shadows and darkness. In one early faith tradition, Jesus and Judas meet again in the land of shadows, and this time Jesus greets Judas with a Kiss. Now that is the power of Easter!

The Gospel of Matthew records that an earthquake rolled the stone away from the tomb in the darkness before dawn. If Steven Spielberg were coordinating the stunts, as dawn’s sun rises over the horizon line, God’s Son also rises. But in actuality all the women found was the darkness of an empty tomb and a stranger who told them Jesus had gone on ahead of them. He had moved out of the darkness.

There are some churches that continue the tradition of Easter Darkness. They begin worship Easter Eve Services at 10:00 p.m. and end at midnight on Easter. But most of us are like the women, struggling to get out the door and down the hill in dawn’s first light. It does not matter where we experience Easter—in the dark, at sunrise, on the road, or in church.

The shadows cannot hold him. The darkness cannot possess him, nothing on the earth or in the heavens above or anything below contains him. He is risen. He is free. And everything else has changed because he is risen. The good news is that He pulls us out of our darkness along with himself. We are free because he is free. And one day we too will rise out of the darkness to greet him at dawn’s first light.