Teachings About Divorce

Matthew 18:23-35 ~ Teachings about divorce

Once again the Pharisees ask Jesus a “how-much-can-we-get-away-with” kind of question—“What’s the least we have to do to comply with the law?” Such is the nature of legalism. The law becomes an end in itself, rather than a means toward a specific end, namely a Godly life.

Jesus’ teachings in particular, and the Jewish law in general are descriptive, rather than prescriptive. Jesus’ kingdom parables always begin, “The kingdom of heaven is like…” The Pharisees’ most frequent approach is, “What must we do to get it?” Jesus has said, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, the meek, those who hunger and thirst for righteousness…” The Pharisees ask, “Is it legal to divorce?” Jesus has said, “If you want to gain your life you must lose it.” The Pharisees ask, “What if… ?”

In this instance, the attitude is this: “I’m going to divorce my wife. How can I do that without going to hell?” [That’s really not a fair paraphrase of what those 1^st century Pharisees asked. “Heaven” and “hell” didn’t mean the same thing to them that it means to most post-reformation Christians today; so I’ve updated the question to reflect what today’s Pharisees are asking.]

What we’re dealing with is the old universal wisdom that always has said goodness is rewarded and evil is punished. The Job narrative (perhaps the oldest portion of Judeo/Christian Scripture) is a rebuttal of that ancient wisdom, and Jesus’ own words negate the reward/punishment model when he says “God causes the rain to fall on the just and the unjust” (Matthew 5:45).

Jesus says (Robinson paraphrase) that marriage is a reflection of God’s created order. It is a matter of the nature of humanity, not an invention of human laws and rules. By extension, since humans are created in the image of God, who is eternally faithful, it is natural that humans also be faithful in their relationships.

Bottom line: marriage is a natural reflection of creation because it is a reflection of the unity that holds all of creation together. Divorce, then, is unnatural, because it goes against God’s will and intention that all created things participate in the harmony of God’s creation.[1]

The Pharisees preferred the law of Moses, which allowed them to do what they already had decided to do. Go ahead and do it. We can always find a loophole later.

It’s really not about divorce. It’s about integrity. Relationships die, just as individuals die. No righteous God would desire or demand that a person remain in a totally abusive relationship.

The status of women in that culture was a gross violation of God’s intention for the unity of all things. Women were chattel, with no rights. A single woman was viewed as flawed, and a divorced woman was even worse. Single, divorced and even widowed women were vulnerable and virtually without protection.

So, for Jesus, it’s really not about divorce. It’s a much broader concern. It’s about how we humans relate in a created universe in which unity and harmony is the will of our creator.

If I am to follow Jesus, my concern will be about mending and healing broken relationships, rather than dismissing them because they’ve become inconvenient. [And, again, there’s a world of difference between inconvenient in intolerable.]

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

Together in the Walk,

Jim

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[1] The clearest statement of this Divine intention may be Ephesians 1:8b-10, “With all wisdom and insight ⁹ he has made known to us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure that he set forth in Christ, ¹⁰ as a plan for the fullness of time, to gather up all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.”

Forgiven-but-Unforgiving

Matthew 18:23-35 ~ The Parable of the Unforgiving Servant is another of many troubling passage in the Gospels. A “servant” owes money to his master, and when the master demands payment, the servant begs for more time. In compassion, the master agrees.

Then, the forgiven servant goes to a fellow servant who owes him money and demands payment. The borrower begs for more time, but the lender servant has him thrown into prison “until he would pay the debt.” There’s my first problem. How can he pay if he’s in prison? Is it assumed by either lender that the debtor has the money to repay the loan, and is simply refusing to pay?

As the narrative continues, the other servants report the forgiven-but-unforgiving servant to the master, who in turn orders the unforgiving servant to be tortured (NRSV) “until he would pay the debt.” That’s my second problem, which is essentially the same as the first.

But my third problem with this parable is devastating. Jesus says, “So my heavenly Father will also do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”

Until that closing statement, the application of the parable has been crystal clear: indeed, I wonder whether the “unpardonable sin”[1] is to refuse to forgive when we have been forgiven.

This statement, on the lips of Jesus, lends support to my conservative Christian brothers and sisters who continue to hold on to an understanding of God as wrathful and vengeful. But if taken literally at face value, Jesus’ comment participates in a description of a schizophrenic God who punishes and/or forgives unpredictably. Even the legalism of the Pharisees is to be preferred! It at least is consistent.

Nor do I find comfort in the “God-is-God-and-can-do-whatever-he-pleases” platitude.

I would have no difficulty seeing this statement as a part of the ongoing testimony/counter testimony approach of Jewish Scriptures[2]—except that the statement is on the lips of Jesus, who already has taken a specific side in the debate by presenting God as capricious in forgiveness as the “other side” presents God as capriciously vengeful.

Jesus seems to be contradicting his own teachings![3]

Jesus was a rabbi, and the rabbis saw no incongruity in stretching or bending reality in order to make a point. The point is the point, and the hyperbole is the method. Humans in general always have had difficulty keeping means and ends in proper relationship.

At the infamous bottom line, if we can see through the smoke, Jesus is again[4] lobbying for forgiveness on the part of his followers. To be forgiven and then to refuse to forgive others is something God takes very seriously. When in doubt, forgive. Such is the way for a follower of Jesus.

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

Together in the Walk,

Jim

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[1] Matthew 12:18, see comments in devotional for Day 39 of Lent, page 24 above.

[2] See devotional for Day 13 of Lent, page 9 above.

[3] In all fairness, this is not the only time in Matthew that Jesus presents God as condemning and even wrathful. The Parable of the Sheep and the Goats in Matthew 25 comes to mind. But on the whole, those statements represent a tiny minority of Jesus’ total teachings, and present us with a serious conundrum: Jesus seemingly as inconsistent and self-contradictory.

[4] See discussion in yesterday’s devotional, page 40 above.

Keeping the Main Thing the Main Thing

I’m going “off track” today; although, I believe my thoughts written here represent a faithful effort to follow Jesus.

First of all, a few disclaimers; in fact, the disclaimers will make up the majority of my blog today, because (1) the general response to a controversial comment seems to be to find ways to discredit it by making it say something other than what it really says, and I want to do everything in my power to ensure that my statement cannot be twisted and misrepresented. And, (2) my actual statement is relatively short.

The issue is the fiasco surrounding San Francisco Quarterback’s chosen way to protest police brutality against people of color. At the very least, he raises an important issue that needs to be discussed. Unfortunately, his chosen way of expressing his protest has proven counterproductive because virtually 100% of the attention has focused on his method, rather than the content of his concern. The tail is wagging the dog.

So, on to my disclaimers:

·         I sincerely believe that the vast majority of police officers in America are good, well-meaning public servants. The issue being protested relates to a tiny minority within the constabulary. Still, one incident is too many.

·         I do believe racism remains a major concern for the American culture; but, I don’t believe everyone in America is a racist. Most racism is sub-conscious, because virtually everyone agrees that it is evil. So, most racism is suppressed and denied, but is a subtle shaper of interracial interaction.

·         And, yes, I believe that racism is not exclusive; that is, there are racists in every ethnic population.

·         I affirm the statement by D. A. Krôlak, posted in his blog August 25, 2015:

ü  If I say, “Black lives matter,” and you think I mean, “Black lives matter more than others,” we’re having a misunderstanding.

ü  If I say, “White privilege is real and it means White people have some unearned social advantages just because they’re white,” and you think I mean, “White privilege is real and it means White people should be ashamed of themselves just because they’re white,” we’re having a misunderstanding.

ü  If I say, “We have a problem with institutionalized racism in our legal system,” and you think I mean, “We have a problem with everyone being racist in our legal system,” we’re having a misunderstanding.

ü  If we’re having these misunderstandings, where are they coming from, and what can we do about them?

·         The misunderstandings to which Krôlak refers originate in the defensive, self-justifying rationalizations I mention above, viz., the effort to discredit a statement by twisting and misrepresenting it to make it say something other than what it really says.

While that last bullet point represents exactly what I hope to avoid with all my disclaimers, the effort, I suspect, will be futile in many cases. So, I’ll just move on to what I have to say:

Colin Kaepernick’s “peaceful protest” is valid, and he is within his constitutional rights to do it exactly as he did. That being said, aside from raising awareness of his concern, his protest does not seem to have advanced his cause in the least; in fact, his method has become a major distraction from his intention. As for awareness, that’s been done. What we need is not more awareness, but a shift in our mutual understanding of that concern. Too many Americans don’t want to be a united culture. They want to be a uniform culture, with their own perspective being the standard for that uniformity.

Until we come to terms with that need to be the standard for everyone else, it matters not what method we use to protest—or affirm—anything. And even if, for argument’s sake, we affirm the validity of a uniform culture, before we can agree on anything, we must understand each other’s perspective.

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

Together in the Walk,

Jim

Stumbling

September 1, 2016

My 2016 Ongoing Journey: Exploring Matthew to discover what following Jesus and becoming more like him would look like.

Matthew 8:6-15 ~ The disciples expect Jesus to lead a military coup to overthrow the Romans and establish a new political kingdom of Israel. They have just asked Jesus about their positions of political power in that kingdom, and Jesus has replied by calling a child and saying, “Unless you become as this child you will not see the kingdom.” So much for political ambition.

Jesus continues now, speaking of influencing “these little ones” and causing them to stumble. As I was reading it this time, I wondered what Jesus meant by stumbling. The fact is, I’ve stumbled along, writing and re-writing this blog for more than a week, now.

The obvious—at least to those who think like Pharisees—is that stumbling means violating some moral absolute. But, I don’t recall Jesus championing moral absolutes. He was much more likely to forgive those who had violated absolute standards.

And I guess I’ve always “assumed” (you know what that means) that “little ones” meant the children. After all, in the narrative immediately prior to this discourse, he had referred to a child as the standard for kingdom citizenship.

But Jesus frequently used the term, “little ones” or “children” to refer to his disciples; and that’s a reasonable conclusion here.

If, then, “little ones” refers to Jesus’ followers, “stumbling” likely means interfering with their walk with him—a walk that clearly went in a direction far different from the moral absolutism of the Pharisees.

So, was Jesus anomic? Hardly! Indeed, Jesus raised the bar compared to the values and norms of the religious establishment of his day. Jesus moved the bar from the pharisaic dictum, “obey the letter of the law and don’t hurt anybody.”

In previous blogs I've made reference to the ancient Egyptian "Book of the Dead," with its three ethical stances: I have harmed the widow; I have not harmed the widow; I have helped the widow. Virtually every religion in human history has had a golden rule. All of them, including Pharisaic Judaism, adopted the middle ethical stance: I have not harmed the widow.

In his inauguration speech (what we call the “Sermon on the Mount”), and throughout his ministry, , Jesus raised the bar and asked, "But have you helped the widow?" Only Jesus’ “golden rule" is proactive; and is augmented with his continual call to love.

Is it a stretch to apply that perspective here?

I wear the label, “Christian,” and thus claim to be a follower of Jesus. Do I relate to others on the basis of the high bar of Jesus’ way, or the more comfortable, self-justifying way of the Pharisees?

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

Together in the Walk,

Jim

The Politics of Jesus

August 11, 2016

My 2016 Ongoing Journey: Exploring Matthew to discover what following Jesus and becoming more like him would look like.

Matthew 17:24-18:5 ~ This is a strange text: it’s got corrupt religious officials, religious taxes, a rabbinic riddle, a Hans Christian Anderson-like fairy tale solution; then it ends with a discussion about politics.

At some point the the tithe had become a legally binding “Temple Tax.” That’s just one of the ways religion is corrupted when it attains political power. Jesus compares the temple tax with tribute exacted by a conquering king.

The clear implication is that the temple tax is illegitimate and thus not binding. But, in order to avoid any occasion for valid criticism of his movement, Jesus performs the old “coin-in-the-fish’s-mouth” trick and sends Peter off to pay the tax.

In context, this event immediately follows the transfiguration, the disciples' failed healing, and the second prediction of the passion. It then leads to the disciples’ question about who will be greatest in the kingdom of heaven.

Do you grasp the irony? They’ve just encountered the corrupting results of political power, and their next response is to ask, essentially, “What positions of political power will we have in the kingdom?” It wouldn’t be the last time they made such an inquiry.

I sincerely believe the greatest human problems—individually, relationally, politically and globally—emerge out of issues of power and control. The relationship between government and any other social manifestation always has been (and, apparently, always will be) a bone of contention among people.

The question of centralized government (The Federalists, led by Alexander Hamilton, John Adams, George Washington, James Madison, et. al.) versus states’ rights (The Anti-Federalists, led by Patrick Henry, Samuel Adams, George Mason, James Monroe, et. al.) almost derailed the ratification of the US Constitution. Indeed, it was essentially that same debate that precipitated the secession of the Confederacy scarcely ¾ of a century later. It’s at the root of today’s political belligerence.

Political debate always has been about who will control who. At the infamous bottom line, while it may seem a simple lust for power, its root is fear and an absence of trust. (Whether the fear and absence of trust is justified is a valid issue for another discussion.)

Jesus’ response to the disciples’ lust for power? “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.  Whoever becomes humble like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven” (18:3-4). How’s that for a political platform?

If I am to follow Jesus, what does that say about my political stance? What would you do if you weren’t afraid?

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

Together in the Walk,

Jim

"Jesus, how could you say that?"

July 28, 2016

My 2016 Ongoing Journey: Exploring Matthew to discover what following Jesus and becoming more like him would look like.

Matthew 17:22-23 ~ (My apologies for the errant textual reference in my previous blog. It should have been verses 14-21, rather than 1-13 of Matthew 17. Hopefully, you found the right passage in spite of my error.)

These two short verses report the second of Jesus’ predictions of his passion. In the first (Matthew 16:21, see my blog from May 20), Peter took him aside and scolded him: “Messiahs don’t talk like that, Jesus! Messiahs don’t die!”

Sometimes following Jesus can become very inconvenient. He challenges our most cherished beliefs (e.g., “God helps those who help themselves.” That’s not in the Bible, which is inconvenient if you’re trying to use your faith as the basis of withholding aid from the poor.)

There was no more strongly held and cherished idea in Israel than the expectations regarding Messiah. He would be “Son of David:” heroic warrior, conquering all Israel’s enemies; majestic king, ruling with power and international esteem. Every nation tipped its hat to Israel when David was king.

Jesus never called himself “Son of David.” “Son of Man” was his chosen self-reference. 81 times in the Gospels he uses the epithet to refer to himself. The distinction, “Son of David/Son of Man”, is a valid and interesting topic for study in a venue more comprehensive than this blog. I point it out simply to identify one of the many ways Jesus challenges our most cherished and strongly held convictions.

No humanly held ideology or tenet of faith can be considered infallible or absolute. Israel anticipated one kind of Messiah; Jesus fulfilled an antithetical reality.

We Christians anticipate a “second coming” that matches the Jewish expectation almost point-for-point. I fully expect that, in whatever way God chooses to fulfill the biblical bases of our anticipation, we will be caught by surprise. Many will be disappointed, and many more will not see it at all; rather, they will continue to watch and wait. Who knows? It may already have happened. It may be a recurring reality.

Meanwhile, what we have is faith. Faith is the decision to act on the basis of what we say we believe. In that faith, my anticipation of what God will do in the future becomes secondary to the concrete pattern of behavior Jesus calls me to follow here and now.

What would you do if you weren’t afraid?

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

Together in the Walk,

Jim

After the Mountaintop

July 20, 2016

My 2016 Ongoing Journey: Exploring Matthew to discover what following Jesus and becoming more like him would look like.

Matthew 17:1-13 ~ A month and three days ago I promised a follow-up to the story of the Transfiguration in Matthew 17:1-13. Well, like I tell my wife, when I say I’m going to do something, I’m going to do it. You don’t have to remind me every few weeks!

The disciples who accompanied Jesus on the Mount of Transfiguration wanted to stay there. It was like an old-fashioned revival meeting: God’s presence was tangible and their spirits were moved to ecstatic emotionalism! “Let’s build three shelters, one for Moses, one for Elijah and one for you. And let’s just stay here.”

But mountaintop experiences are, by nature, short-lived. Unless you have a delivery service that comes up the mountain to you, sooner or later the necessities of life make it necessary to come down.

Maybe it’s not so much that we want to preserve and relish the mountaintop experience as that we don’t want to go back down the mountain and face what we know is there.

When Jesus and the three disciples returned from the mountaintop, there was confusion and frustration (the other disciples had proven ineffectual), and there was human need. Jesus took care of the need; but the disciples were distracted by their own ineptitude. “Why couldn’t we heal him?”

Jesus response to the whole incident seems harsh: “You faithless and perverse generation, how much longer must I be with you? How much longer must I put up with you?” And then, in response to the disciples’ incompetence, “Because of your little faith. For truly I tell you, if you have faith the size of a^[c] mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move; and nothing will be impossible for you.”

He might as well have said, “You have no faith at all!” I wonder if he was saying that their faith was misdirected—that their faith was in their own abilities. I can relate to that.

We humans are an amazing creation. Our accomplishments to this point in history are too many to count or assess. But maybe your experience is similar to mine: the more I learn, the more I realize I don’t know. The more I accomplish, the more I realize remains undone.

At the risk of espousing a “God-of-the-gaps” theology, there comes a time in human experience—both individual and corporate—when we must reach beyond our human limitations to enter into partnership with the divine. I’ll not argue whether such a partnership puts us in touch with a source outside ourselves or releases what already is in us (although I lean in the latter direction).

Faith is the decision to act on the basis of what we say we believe. If I truly am to follow Jesus, I will do just that.

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

Together in the Walk,

Jim