The Faithful Writer redux

Haydn over at The Giraffe Pen has written a summary and offered some reflections about the writer's conference on Saturday that I mentioned back here. His footnote about whether Christians ought ever to be deliberately 'aggressive' and 'annoying' (as was suggested during one panel time) has generated an interesting conversation.

UPDATE: I didn't get a chance to offer my own opinion on this matter as I was in a rush when I posted this last night. While I am all for being provocative and subversive, I do not think that these straightforwardly equate with being aggressive or annoying. Paul says Let your speech always be gracious, seasonsed with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone (Colossians 4.6). It is the very graciousness of our speech that is most tasty. This doesn't necessarily mean being 'polite', but we are not gospel shock-jocks, out to provoke any reaction we can. To think we are assumes that apathy is the greatest problem our hearers face. However, in my experience, apathy can itself often be a protective mechanism to avoid repeating the pain of previous ungracious speech.

The discussion has also been raging over on MPJ's blog (and here).

News

Last night Jessica and I had another chance to enjoy the hospitality of RPA and said goodbye to an old friend. Read the full story on my other blog.

Also in the news is my rector Tim Foster, who has written a report on hospitality and church, which has made the front page of the Anglican Media website (Tim is holding the platter in this very staged shot, taken at our recent Dawkins forum).

And for those interested and in Sydney, Prof Larry Hurtado will be giving a seminar at Macquarie Uni tomorrow night on Early devotion to Jesus in which he will present his research challenging the common scholarly assumption that the early church's christology evolved gradually from 'low' to 'high'. More details here.

God with us? VI

Tasting the future today
And these tastes of the future, these glimpses of God's coming presence, are genuine tastes, real glimpses, because of the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of the future. The physical resurrected body of Christ is hidden with God, but he has poured his Spirit, the Spirit of the risen Christ, into those who follow his way. And so by the Spirit, God is with us today. Not physically, not in fullness, not unveiled. But truly with us. The Spirit blows where he will (John 3.8). We can’t control or summon him like a pet dog. But when the gospel is truly proclaimed and people turn to Christ, there is the Spirit, there is God with us. When love overcomes hate and indifference, when death doesn’t get the last word on the meaning of our life, when we acknowledge our interdependence with all living things, there is the Spirit, there is God with us. When we share a meal of bread and wine and find ourselves bound together by a bond of peace, there is the Spirit, there is God with us. Where Christ is proclaimed and honoured in word and deed, there is the Spirit, there is God with us. Where there is a broken heart that cries to God in loneliness and anguish, there is the Spirit, there is the presence of God: The LORD is near to the brokenhearted, and saves the crushed in spirit (Psalm 34.18).

I recently received an email from a friend in long-term isolation on a cancer ward which ended like this:

I feel God's presence very strongly at the moment and throughout all of this there have been many blessings. I have realised more than ever that I would rather cross a raging river with God that stroll on the river bank without Him. I cannot imagine what it would be like to go through this without Him.

God is an ever-present help in trouble (Ps 46.1). This help is not necessarily what we expect or demand, but exceeds all we can ask or imagine.

But what of our ordinary life? Is God with me day by day?

For thus says the high and lofty one who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with those who are contrite and humble in spirit.

- Isaiah 57.15

The Spirit of Christ, like Christ himself, prefers to hang out with those who recognise their need, who come to life with empty hands and are quick to give thanks. Is this me? Am I contrite and humble, or am I so full of myself there's no room for anyone else, no room for God? Are we as a community humble? Is God with us?

God’s Spirit, the Spirit of Christ, breathes life into us as the body of Christ, as a community tied together by our experience of God with us. This is what animates our meetings, what quickens our passions; this is who gives us a word of comfort or careful rebuke, a word of apology or hope. This is who moves us to care for the lonely, to stand up for the weak and voiceless, to share with our neighbour. This is who enables us to live fearlessly. It is the Spirit of Christ, God with us. God is not stingy. Our everyday lives are saturated with hints and echoes of his presence. Moments of beauty, of humility, of grace and truth.

We live everyday in the presence of God. But he is not our magic talisman, our lucky charm, our guarantee of success, our assurance of being right. He is not so much on our side, as beside us – in our neighbour – and inside us, giving us no rest until we find our rest in him. God is with us, but he is not in our box. Remember, he sits on top of the box, ruling as king, enthroned between the cherubim. He is lifted up on a cross, ruling as king as the nails are driven home. He is alive and amongst us as we live and move and have our being. He can be found in an embrace, seen in a gift, heard in a kind word, yet heaven and earth cannot contain him. He is here. He is coming soon.

Come Lord Jesus. Amen.
Series: I; II; III; IV; V; VI.

Harry Potter: the end or a beginning?

OK - I finished late last night. Time to discuss it. I'd love to hear your reflections and theories. Those who don't want spoilers can avoid the comments. This was certainly the most theological volume of the series.

God with us? V

Today: God with us
But what about us? What about today? It may be all very well to say that if you lived two millennia ago in Palestine you could have seen Immanuel, God with us, but is God with us? And what might this mean?

In one sense, Immanuel has come and returned to be with the Father. He is physically absent. It is no longer possible to see God in the flesh as it once was. We are waiting for his return. Indeed, this is one way of thinking about what our lives are about: we live preparing for the presence of God. We await not simply the return of the risen Jesus, but the day when everything is set to rights and the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD as the waters cover the sea (Habakkuk 2.14).

This is what we are waiting for – the ultimate and permanent fulfillment of the promise: ‘I will be your God and you will be my people.’ Here’s how the final pages of the Bible envisage it:

And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “See, the home [lit. tabernacle] of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them; he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.” And the one who was seated on the throne said, “See, I am making all things new."

- Revelation 21.2-5a

Our lives are preparing for this day. We are maturing our taste to enjoy the messianic banquet, we are exercising our heart so it can be inundated with God’s love, we are training our eyes to see the invisible God. You are getting ready to be able to stand in the presence of divine glory, to reflect and shine with that glory. The tastes we get of the life to come now are only a taste, but they are genuine tastes. Whenever you are generous to someone in need, that’s a taste of the future. When you welcome a stranger, when you forgive a deep wound, when you resist a chance to gain at someone else’s expense, when you keep a promise, when you fail but confess and turn your life around, when you bless instead of curse, when you trust despite fear, when you hope despite pain, when you love despite busyness – you are catching a glimpse of the future presence of God.
Ten points for guessing the cathedral in the picture.
Series: I; II; III; IV; V; VI.

Live Green

City of Sydney is organising a Live Green day at Victoria Park on Saturday 25th August. There will be stalls, entertainment, kids activities and workshops/seminars on a wide range of topics.

Harry Potter: the beginning of the end

I'll be getting my hands on a (borrowed) copy of #7 this evening. No spoilers in the comments please.

More than five years ago, I wrote an English honours thesis comparing the representation of children and childhood in Harry Potter and Narnia. At that stage, only the first four books had been published and no movies had come out. I'll be very interested to see whether my claims still hold up in light of the final revelations.

As is often the case, the best thing I've read on Harry Potter is found on Alastair's blog in a lovely post called 'Of Boggarts'. Here's a taste:

Christian authors can and should tell stories of Greek and Norse gods, of dragons, giants, goblins, faeries, of witches on broomsticks, of pixies, gnomes, elves and dwarves. These stories are the chains in which defeated Boggarts are paraded in triumph before the Risen Christ.

Also from Alastair comes a link to this catchy video which I can't get out of my head.

God with us? IV

Immanuel

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning ...The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.

- John 1.1-2, 14.

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling – or literally, ‘tabernacled’ – among us. This one who is the expression of God, set up his tent of flesh and blood. He lived amongst us humans, as a human. Just as God’s glory had dwelled amongst Israel in a tent in the wilderness, so John says we have seen his glory, the glory as of the Father's only Son, full of grace and truth.

The disciples did not see a pillar of fire or God’s glory in the tabernacle like the Israelites. They saw the glory of the One who had come from the Father. According to John, this glory was seen in his obedience to his Father (17.4), in his betrayal (13.30-31), suffering and death (12.23-24). This was a surprising manifestation of God’s glory: he was crowned king (19:14, 19), but with a crown of thorns (19:2). He was lifted up (3:14; 12:32), but upon a cross. This is God’s glorious presence. This is what it looks like: a peasant being unjustly executed by a brutal regime. This deconstructs all our assumptions about God’s presence. If God is on our side, perhaps this is what it will look like. Not fame, success, security and comfort, but difficulty, pain, loss and humiliation. Grace and truth are costly. Obedience is not an easy road. To walk with God is to carry a cross. If God is with us, it might look and feel more like dying than victory. If God is on our side, or rather, if we’re on God’s side, we ought to expect to often seem to be losing. We ought to be surprised and wary if we seem to be always amongst the powerful, if we find ourselves rich and comfortable. God’s glorious presence was found most decisively in one who lived amongst the outcast and was himself rejected and despised.

For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No-one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father's side, has made him known.

- John 1.17-18

Jesus has made the invisible God known; he embodied God with us. He was even called Immanuel, which means ‘God with us’. God has been on the side of humanity and that is what it looked like. We need to keep on putting our ideas of what God is like, of what it is like for God to be with us, through Jesus, who has brought grace and truth. We don’t get to decide what we think God is like, what we think God’s presence might be like. We might like to think of God in a particular way, but unless he looks Christ-shaped, cross-shaped, then we’re fooling ourselves. To ignore Jesus, even to honour him as one among many, is to ignore God amongst us.
Five points for the identity of the statue. Five more to translate the Greek. Five more to give the NT reference. And fifteen if you can guess the city in which the picture was taken. No more than one correct guess per person.
Series: I; II; III; IV; V; VI.

Can we trust what the Gospels say about Jesus?

Andrew Errington, a previous guest-poster turned blogger has put together an excellent short resource for those interested in a brief introduction to the historicity of the four accounts of Jesus found in the pages of the New Testament. It can be downloaded for free. In twelve pages Andrew answers 'Where did the Gospels come from?', 'What are the Gospels?' and 'What evidence is there?'. An appendix looks at the non-canonical Gospels.
These ruins are just outside an important NT town. Eight points for guessing which one. Photo by HCS.

God with us? III

Dangerous goodness
During their time in the wilderness, the tabernacle pitched in the middle of the camp reminded the Israelites that God was with them. He had promised to meet Moses from his 'throne' between the golden cherubim above the ark of the covenant (Exodus 25.22). The Israelites could therefore say “God is with us”. Indeed, he had promised: “I will be your God and you will be my people.” His presence protected them, provided for them, guided them through the wilderness, and set out the good regulations by which they were to live. But this wasn’t all cause for celebration. To have the maker of heaven and earth living with you is not a safe prospect.

When world leaders arrive in Sydney for the APEC Conference this September, we’re going to know about it: road closures, parking restrictions, security checks, traffic escorts, a public holiday and a highly visible police presence. Current estimates place the security budget at $169 million. Many of the world’s leaders will be in our midst and every measure will be taken to ensure their security.

But when the living God dwells in the midst of his people, the precautions and barriers are not to keep him safe from the people, but to keep the people safe from him. God might have been with them, but he wasn’t in any straightforward sense simply on their side, at their beck and call. They could not keep God in a box. God didn’t live in the box, he sat on top of it, a king on his throne between the cherubim.*
*1 Samuel 4.4; 2 Samuel 6.2; 2 Kings 19.15; 1 Chron 13.6; Psalm 81.1; 99.1; Isaiah 37.16.

There’s a great passage in C. S. Lewis’ The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, where the children are speaking with Mr and Mrs Beaver about the prospect of meeting the great lion Aslan, who in the novels represents the presence of God.

    “Is he - quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion.”
    “That you will, dearie, and no mistake," said Mrs Beaver; "if there’s anyone who can appear before Aslan without their knees knocking, they're either braver than most or else just silly.”
    “Then he isn't safe?” said Lucy.
    “Safe?” said Mr Beaver; “don't you hear what Mrs Beaver tells you? Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn't safe. But he's good. He's the King, I tell you.”

Dangerous goodness. That’s what it’s like to have God dwelling in your midst. Dangerous goodness. No one is safe from his purifying, life-giving power.
Apologies for using this Lewis quote again. I find it very useful.
Series: I; II; III; IV; V; VI.

Amazing Grace

This film about William Wilberforce and the abolition of British slavery comes out in Australia on Thursday. A group from All Souls and friends will be going to see it together on Thursday 2nd August (Thursday week) at Palace Cinemas on Norton Street. We'll go back to the church café for coffee and discussion afterwards. Let me know if you're interested. If the group is large enough we can get a good discount.

I'd love to start a regular (monthly?) discussion forum at All Souls, probably on Thursday evenings, for chewing over some contemporary and perennial issues. I'll keep you updated as this idea develops.
Eight points for explaining the link between this image and the post.

Spam, spam, spam, egg and spam

We all know what it is. Not so many realise that the term originated from its use in this Monty Python sketch (or the script). Someone may know the correct technical terms, but not only are there straightforward spam emails promising enlarged bank accounts, kudos, pharmaceutical access and somatic appendages, there are also those designed to see if you respond by clicking a link or composing a reply. As readers (and automated spam-filters) get better at avoiding spam, spam-writers have become (a little) more creative, for instance, sending a 'news headline' of considerable interest with a link to the 'full story'. However, a (possible) new one I hadn't seen before was an email praising my blog in general terms (without any mention of specific content), expressing a desire to ask a question, but first wanting to know if I reply to emails.

If this was a genuine email from a regular reader, then my apologies for (anonymously) embarrassing you. Please ask your question. I do reply to emails, but a tip for anyone wanting to contact a stranger by email: make it clear you're not a spam-generator. And a tip to spam-writers: this would make a good scam.

God with us? II

God with Israel: Exodus 25
The first half of Exodus is a riveting and rollicking story: a baby saved from the bulrushes and brought up amongst foreigners; murder and betrayal; a burning bush and plagues; dramatic rescue and great rejoicing; suffering and complaining; bread from heaven, a flaming mountain, earthquakes and God himself writing on tablets of stone. It’s the kind of material you’d make a movie out of – or maybe two.

But the movies – and most readers – give up when they hit the second half. After 20 or so chapters of action, most of the second half of the book seems to be building instructions.

My in-laws are architects and so I’m learning to love buildings, but even I find these chapters hard going. First come seven chapters (Exodus 25-31) filled with detailed instructions on making a box (ark), table, lampstand, tent (tabernacle), altar, courtyard, dress clothes for priests and more, then a few chapters on the golden calf incident (Exodus 32-34), before the same elements appear again in similar detail recording the actual construction of each element (Exodus 35-40).

All together, it probably looked something like this or this or this.

The tabernacle was basically a mobile tent with portable furniture. The Israelites traveled with it and set it up wherever they pitched camp while wandering through the wilderness. The tabernacle would be in the center of the camp, and the 12 tribes of Israel would set up their tents around it. There was a fenced courtyard, and then the tabernacle itself was divided into two sections: the holy place, which contained the lampstand, table and altar, and the holy of holies, which contained the ark of the covenant. This ark was a wooden box overlaid with gold in which were placed the tablets recording the covenant (binding agreement) made between God and Israel at Mount Sinai. On top of the ark were golden statues of two winged angels (cherubim) facing each other.

Unless you’re an archeologist or have a thing for tents, it’s all a bit of a slog to read. What’s it all doing here? What’s it all about? The key is in Exodus 25.8: And have them make me sanctuary, so that I may dwell among them. God's presence in the midst of his people Israel - that's what this whole section is about: the concern for holiness; the importance of the sacrifices; the repetition and symbolism of different numbers; the position and orientation of the tabernacle; how the quality of the metals increases the closer they are to Holy of Holies (bronze, silver, gold); the way the ark was meant to represent the throne of God, such that he would sit ‘enthroned between the cherubim’. All this was to highlight what an awesome and weighty privilege it was for the Israelites to have the living God in their midst.
Series: I; II; III; IV; V; VI.

Permablitz

Rachel just sent me this article from The Age about Permablitzing: permaculture meets Backyard Blitz. What a great idea! Volunteers use permaculture principles to transform a backyard to make the household more sustainable, reducing the need for heavily transported food, and building community in the process. I nominate Rachel and Alex to start a movement in Sydney.

The Faithful Writer

On Saturday 28th July, CASE and Matthias Media are running a one day conference at UNSW called The Faithful Writer for Christians to think about how writing can be service. The main speakers will be Tony Payne and Greg Clarke, and then there will be a number of panel discussions: Writing as Ministry; Writing and the Internet (including yours truly on the panel); Christians and fiction; Writing for impact. Sounds fun? Registration is $70/$55 before 21st July or $90/$75 after it.

It just got a write up today in Southern Cross, including a scintillating interview with one of the panellists.

The Internet

We've heard that a million monkeys at a million keyboards could produce the complete works of Shakespeare; now, thanks to the Internet, we know it's not true.

- Robert Wilensky

God with us? I

God on our side
I recently saw a documentary hosted by Australian comedian Andrew Denton called God on my side. Denton tours the stalls of the National Religious Broadcasters convention in Texas interviewing people, predominantly fundamentalist Christians. In is usual way, Denton let his subjects do most of the talking and gets them to reveal quite a lot about themselves, their beliefs and their foibles. But the title of the program shows the heart of what Denton thinks these people believe: With God on my side. The implication is that God is my magic talisman, my lucky charm, my guarantee of success, my assurance of being right. If God is with me, who can be against me? If he’s on my side, then heaven help my enemies!

Is God on our side? What would that even mean? How could you know? Is God with us, or against us? Where is God? Where can he be found?
This is the first post in a new short series (based on a recent sermon I preached on Exodus 25).
Series: I; II; III; IV; V; VI.
I'll be really impressed (and give fifteen points) if someone can guess the Sydney suburb.

Hart on learning to see

Sometimes we don't see what's under our noses. Sometimes we see but do not perceive. Having one's eyes open and head pointed in the right direction is no guarantee of correct vision. Hart makes an excellent point about the labour of vision that is required in order to see straight in a world bent out of shape:

[A]ll of nature is a shattered mirror of divine beauty, still full of light, but riven by darkness. ... [T]o see the goodness indwelling all creation requires a labour of vision that only faith in Easter can sustain; but it is there, effulgent, unfading, innocent, but languishing in bondage to corruption, groaning in anticipation of a glory yet to be revealed, both a promise of the Kingdom yet to come and a portent of its beauty.

- David Bentley Hart, The Doors of the Sea:
Where Was God in the Tsunami? (Eerdmans: 2005), 102-3.

Learning to see creation rather than merely 'nature' does not mean closing our eyes to the pain all around (and within). Instead, it is to look thankfully not fearfully, seeing abundance rather than scarcity. It is to look caringly rather than instrumentally, seeing beauty before usefulness. It is to look hopefully, seeking glimpses of the glory yet to be revealed.

One does not live by bread alone...

Having baked (and eaten) a lot of fresh bread recently, I consider this far from self-evident.

July points update

The month is only half over, but there has been much activity on the July points table. After Matt Moffitt established a strong early lead, first Andrew, then Jonathan have drawn near. The latter has just slipped ahead. But it's still wide open with hundreds of points available. Remember, there are points for picking this month's winner. Apologies to those who consider this a frivolous distraction from the rest of my blog. Apologies to those who consider the rest of my blog a frivolous distraction from this.
Ten points for the best suggested title of this work.

Williams on church leadership

What I have been proposing is that the empty tomb tradition is, theologically speaking, part of the Church’s resource in resisting the temptation to ‘absorb’ Jesus into itself, and thus part of what its confession of the divinity of Jesus amounts to in spiritual and political practice. Jesus is not the possession of the community, not even as ‘raised into the kerygma’, because he is alive, beyond qualification or risk, he ‘lives to God’. The freedom of Jesus to act, however we unpack that deceptively simple statement, is not exhausted by what the community is doing or thinking – which allows us to say that Jesus’ role for the community continues, vitally, to be that of judge, and that those who are charged with speaking authoritatively for or in the community stand in a very peculiar and paradoxical place. The distance from the community that is built into their role has to be something other than a claim to share the kind of distance that exists between the risen Jesus and the community. They remain under the judgement of the Risen One, along with the rest of the community, and their task is to direct attention away from themselves to Jesus, to reinforce the community’s awareness of living under Jesus’ judgement.

- Rowan Williams, 'Between the Cherubim: the Empty Tomb and the Empty Throne' in On Christian Theology (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000), 192-93.

This fascinating essay is sobering reading for one charged to speak in the community this Sunday. I've re-read it since I'm preaching on the tabernacle (and ark) in Exodus 25-31. Here's another quote from earlier in the essay where Williams is setting up the imagery of the 'empty throne', the space between the cherubim on the ark of the covenant, where the God of Israel is said to dwell. Williams reads it an emobodiment (or disembodiment as the case may be) of the second commandment:

The cherubim flanking the ark define a space where God would be if God were anywhere (the God of Judah is the one who sits between the cherubim or even ‘dwells’ between the cherubim); but there is no image between the cherubim. If you want to see the God of Judah, this is where he is and is not: to ‘see’ him is to look into the gap between the holy images. What is tangible and accessible, what can be carried in procession or taken to war as a palladium is not the image of God but the throne of God, the place where he is not. … YHWH is not capable of being represented definitively or indeed at all except as the one who is invisibly enthroned on the kapporeth [mercy seat] of the ark. … [There is a] non-representable, non-possessible dimension [to] the paradoxical manifestation of God to God’s people.

- Williams, 'Between the Cherubim', 187.

The prohibition against images of God is to remind the people of God's freedom, that though he might be 'on our side', he is never in our possession. He can't be put in a box, because he sits on the box!

Yet there is another dynamic here that Williams places less emphasis on: God makes his own image. Jesus is the image of the invisible God (Col 1.15; Heb 1.1-3). God's transcendence and invisibility might lead us to silence about God, theology dumbfounded. But this is not the case because God himself speaks. He supplies his own icon in Jesus. This is how we are to speak and think about God. This is how we are to follow and obey him. This is what we can and must hope for. God's freedom is not an endless deferral of open potential. He decisively acts to give himself.

Nonetheless, in doing so, he does not give himself away. He remains the Lord. And this is the thrust of Williams' christological point in the first quote. We don't own Jesus. Jesus' friends can and do get him wrong.
Eight points for correctly naming this English abbey.