Transformation--My Testimony

I grew up in the Southern Baptist Church during the 1940s and 50s. I cherish and honor that heritage, even though I have moved a considerable distance from it, theologically, politically (sic), and biblically. My passion for the faith and for the teachings of Jesus came from that background. I literally do not remember a time in my life that I didn’t believe and accept that “Jesus loves me, this I know; for the Bible tells me so.”

Undeniably, my dependence upon the Bible as the standard of measure (canon is the official word for that) for matters of faith and Christian living came also from that legacy.

Ironically, it also was the study of the Bible that began my shift away from my native church. I have an inquisitive mind. It’s in my DNA; but it proved a liability in my early years in the Southern Baptist Church. From my earliest memories I had questioned specific applications of Scripture; but those questions were discouraged. I was even told, “There are just some things we’re not supposed to know.”

I didn’t accept that then; and I don’t accept it today. During my last year in high school and through my undergraduate years, I frequently said, “I’m not fully a Southern Baptist; but, I’m closer to them than anybody else.” The truth was that I really didn’t know much about what anybody else believed.

It has been said, “There are no atheists in foxholes.” Well, I’ve never been close to being an atheist; nevertheless, when I was sent to Vietnam by the Unites States Marine Corp, my dependence upon my faith was at perhaps it’s highest level.

I took it upon myself to “be in the Word” as much as possible, and since I was assigned to headquarters company, headquarters battalion, 3^rd Marine Division, I had time and some level of security in which to do so. I decided to begin with Paul’s epistle to the Romans: you know, where Martin Luther found such discrepancies between what he had been taught and what the Bible says.

Well, I was letting the Bible speak to me because that’s what my preachers and Sunday School teachers had told me to do; but very early I began to note that what I thought was in the Bible, really wasn’t there. I even found some things that actually were counter to what I had been taught. The more I read the Bible, the less I could reconcile everything I had learned with what I found in the Bible.

At first it was a troubling experience—even frightening. After all, I was supposed to believe what I was taught, wasn’t I—not to question God or the Bible? What I came to realize was that the real message I was taught was to not question what I was being taught about God or the Bible. There is a difference.

But, in the Epistle of Romans I discovered that my relationship with God is not dependent upon believing right doctrine. It is dependent upon my accepting Jesus’ teaching that God already loves me and wants to make my life full and complete, regardless of—sometimes in spite of—what I believe at any given moment. Faith, then, is not a set of beliefs or doctrines, but is the willingness to live as if I truly believe what I say I believe.

Indeed, those moments of anxiety began to be transformed into a sense of comfort as I began to realize I had been trusting correct doctrine instead of trusting God as the basis of my relationship with God. Out of a fear of hell I had been driven to cling to doctrine—to put my faith in it rather than in the God revealed in Jesus. That realization is both freeing and motivating. In recalling that transformative time in my life, I am reminded of John Gillespie McGee’s poem, “High Flight:”

 Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,
I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air . . .

Up, up the long, delirious burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or ever eagle flew —
And, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.

It was in reading the Bible that I slipped the surly bonds of my faith culture. And, time after time, it has been in reading the Bible that I have discovered new understandings of God’s unlimited, unmerited grace in contrast to the restrictive, legalistic, and exclusionary doctrines that are born out of human fear and lack of trust in that same grace.

That’s the way it looks through the Flawed Glass that is my world view.

Together in the Walk,

Jim

My 2016 Lenten Journey--Day 28

March 8, 2016 ~ Day 28

My 2016 Lenten Journey: Exploring the Gospels to discover what following Jesus and becoming more like him would look like? ‘And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself” (John 12:32 NRSV).

Matthew 9:2-8 ~ Jesus said to the paralytic, your sins are forgiven; but the scribes said, “This man is sinning. Only God can forgive sins.” Sometimes our rigid faith formulas actually get in the way of the Gospel. Sometimes the primary purpose they serve is to rationalize an avoidance of being and doing all God as called us to be and do.

The cliché says, "Christianity is not a religion, it's a relationship." Am I clinging to some doctrine as a substitute for faith? How does my doctrine get in the way of following Jesus? How might it mislead others?

Whoever has seen me has seen the Father (John 14:9 NRSV)

‘And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself” (John 12:32 NRSV).

That's the way it looks through the flawed glass that is my world view.

Together in the Walk,

Jim

Trust is the Opposite of Certainty

We have seen that Jesus interpreted Scripture in the rabbinic spirit of faithful questioning motivated by love. We have noted that Jesus’ interpretation of Scripture was in direct contrast to that of the Pharisees and other religious leaders of his time, who read the Scriptures in a spirit of unquestioning obedience and were motivated by an obsession with correct doctrine. The Pharisees were concerned about who was “right” and who was “wrong,” and were determined to enforce their “right” understanding, even if such an effort required violence.

We have said that over the centuries the Church has tended not to follow the pattern of Jesus, but rather to follow the pattern of the Pharisees, striving to maintain orthodoxy and labeling those who disagree as heretics. The result has been a long history of various manifestations of the church enforcing their authority through violence or the threat of violence—all in God’s name.

The struggle to know what is “right” has replaced Grace as the foundation of faith. In far too many cases our trust is more in the correctness of our doctrine than in the Grace of God. Such an application of religious faith establishes an “us vs. them” mentality, which always leans toward an exclusionary witness and far too often is forcefully inflicted.

While the exclusionary witness establishes categories for judging who is acceptable and who is not, Jesus’ witness was to go out among the outcasts and the fringe people—to eat with them, to touch them and through loving inclusion to restore their lives to wholeness. Too often our approach has been to demand that those on the outside become “like us” before they can gain admission and acceptance. Our doctrine becomes "the way, the truth and the life."

We all read Scripture selectively, and justification can indeed be found for both approaches. They stand in direct contradiction within the Holy writ, and we choose one way or the other:

1.       The way the Pharisees chose: unquestioning obedience to what they had determined to be the “right” doctrine (Law), and enforcing that doctrine as the prerequisite of faithfulness—excluding (and sometimes punishing with violence or threat of violence) all who do not conform (including Jesus).

2.      The way Jesus chose: faithful questioning the violence in Scripture and bearing witness to unconditional love (Grace), including all humanity in a divine embrace of reconciliation and restoration. All humanity. And "All" means "All."

Our celebrated First Amendment rights which grant freedom of speech and religion actually came about in direct response to the church’s legacy of persecution and rampant bloodshed committed in the sincere (but sincerely wrong) effort to maintain purity of doctrine. As a result of those Constitutional rights, there are no more burnings at the stake today.

So, what is the greater wrong: not getting the formulation of the Trinity quite right, or slaughtering those who do get it wrong? What is the greater sin: questioning a doctrine or working to destroy people’s careers and livelihoods because they question it?

Equally important as what we profess is how we profess it and how we live what we profess. When we act in any way to harm others in the name of Scripture or faith or morality we demonstrate that we are neither scriptural, moral nor faithful. Jesus said the whole law and the prophetic writings were predicated upon love of God, love of neighbor and love of self (Matthew 22:36-40). And Paul wrote, “Love does no harm to a neighbor. Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law” (Romans 13:10) When we do not act in love, nothing we do is right, and nothing is faithful, not even according to the law.

The simple formula of the New Testament witness is “Grace Trumps Law.” It’s simple; but it’s not easy. It requires that we “let go” of our efforts to justify ourselves through adherence to “right” doctrine, and that we instead “take hold” of the Grace God offers and surrender to the power of that Grace to mold us into the likeness of Jesus. That whole process of “letting go” and “taking hold” is called “Trust.” Trust is the opposite of certainty, and certainty is a first cousin of control.

And we are a culture of control addicts. Maybe we need a 12-Step program to facilitate recovery. “Hello. My name is Jim; and I’m a controlaholic.”

That’s the way I see it through the flawed glass that is my world view.

Together in the Walk,

Jim