broken eikon

Hey you guys! I’m not quite sure exactly how many of you read the blog (I think somewhere between 5-6 million), but I wonder if you would help me with an experiment. I was thinking about doing a video blog similar to an old blog that I used to do on myspace. First, there would be a call for questions (spiritual, theological, pastoral, or otherwise). Then, I would collect the billions of questions and choose some to answer. Then I would do a video blog answering the questions. That simple. So send me your questions, from the theology of Karl Barth to the proper way to evangelize a Christian. This should be fun…

So I was reading the Presbyterian book of confessions today. I came across the confession of 1967, and I have to say… I was blown away. In 1967, the Presbos adopted this confession of faith as a response to “racial discrimination, nationalistic arrogance, and family and class conflict”.  It was very responsive to biblical scholarship and  asks the church to read scripture with literary and historical context in mind. There are many really really cool parts, but this really stuck out to me is line 9.45, containing the following words…, “this search (for reconciliation and peace) requires that the nations pursue fresh and responsible relations across every line of conflict, even at risk to national security, to reduce areas of strife and to broaden international understanding… Although nations may serve God’s purposes in history, the church which identifies the sovereignty of any one nation or any one way of life with the cause of God denies the lordship of Christ and betrays his calling”.

“Even at risk to national security”?

Can anyone find me another statement of faith that states that nations should pursue reconciliation even at their own risk? That sounds too much like Christ for me…

And that last part about identifying any one nation or way of life with God’s will means denying the Lordship of Christ. Dang.

love it…

This article by Micheal Moore is really good. Don’t get me wrong, I am not what you would consider a fan of his. Even when I want to like him, I struggle to find him compelling. But when someone, anyone, gets Jesus right, I am committed to being the trumpeter. So check it out.

So… this is how I feel sometimes talking to some people about faith/scripture….

I know, I know. I need to listen to more music. But to be honest, I haven’t exhausted the bands I like yet. So I suppose Fiver Iron Frenzy, Sixpence, Zeppelin, and BNL will continue to get lyric time on my blog.

I love this song.

Despite our selfish selves
Despite all loss of hope
Despite our lack of faith
Despite our stony hearts
Despite the waning moon
Despite the ebbing tide
Of how we think this world should be

Praise God from whom all blessings flow
Praise Him all creatures here below
Praise Him above ye Heavenly host
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost

The Hebrew word for the sea is yam. In Hebrew, the sea is considered chaotic and scary. Yam also happens to be a Canaanite deity. Which one? The God of primordial chaos and raging sea. Fits, right? Yam is also shown to be a serpent called Lotan, with 7 heads. Well, it seems that tons of mythologies have gods of the sea as chaotic deities that are also serpents. In Norse Mythology, Jörmungandr, the midgard serpent is the snake that circles the worlds seas and will slay Thor during Ragnarok. Typhon (typhoon…), in Greek mythology is the uber-powerful Titan that fought Zeus and is laden with serpentine coils. Tiamat, the goddess of the sea and chaos, is a dragon often in Babylonian myths. The serpent of Chaos in Egyptian myths is Apep. Vritra, the serpent God kept the waters of the world captive in Vedic Brahmanism.

So interestingly, Christian writers began to merge their idea of Satan with the primal chaos of the sea serpents. This is why we get Christian writers talking about Satan being the one who deceived Adam and Eve. While this is certainly a valid opinion to have, I tend to see things a bit differently. I see two different evils in the world. First, there is this ancient Chaos, represented in the seas, formless and void. This is the thing that God overcame when creation happened. This is what we fight against when we chose life over death. This is what is overcome when we chose order and light over chaos and darkness. But there is another evil.

There is the evil that desires not destruction, but power. The anti-God. Not opposite of God, but putting itself in place of God. This is what the scripture calls the Satan. The powers and principalities. The “world”. The system of domination that is in our world today as militaristic, technological, therapeutic imperialism. The suicide machine that focuses on itself as the only thing. Selfishness incarnate. Now, you may see similarities, but make no mistake, the Satan does not desire destruction of all. It needs creation in order to function, because it is a parasite. It corrupts the life.

So… just thought you should know…

Last semester, a friend and I decided to embrace a more honest approach to theology. The first step is to admit the places we are coming from, so that others (and ourselves) can wiegh those presuppositions (or biases) against whatever theology we are espousing. Then it is up to the hearer to make a judgment on how those biases influence (or don’t) what we say. For example, I grew up getting beat up by green martians, then go on to propose a theology that God hates green martians. I was likely influenced in my theology by green martians. NO ONE has a pure theological stance. EVERYONE has biases. If we can admit them upfront, our theology will not have to be judged so harshly by others if we have already judges ourselves. It’s called authenticity. The next blog is my attempt at it.

John 10:7 says Jesus is the door. As we all know, doors are made from wood. So Jesus, if you take the Bible as God’s word, is made of wood. Now, here is the freaky part. According to the church councils of the 4th century, Jesus is the same substance as God. Therefore, follow me here… God is made of wood. Now to take it to a whole other level. The Holy Spirit, according to those same councils, is the same substance as the Father and Christ. Now…ready?… The Spirit is the same word in Hebrew for breath. Therefore, Jesus=door=wood=God=wood=Spirit=wood=Spirit=breath. Jesus had to breath. Jesus was a breath cannibal. He breathed in himself, which was wood. And since we know humans don’t breathe wood, Jesus was not human.

Thank you for indulging me on this particular piece of stupidity.

Today at school, I heard a pastor say, “I don’t care about the education, I just need the piece of paper”, in regards to degrees, etc… He was echoed by a person hoping to go into ministry, who eagerly agreed. The situation came up because they found themselves disagreeing with something a professor said. They proceeded to grow in solidarity that they simply “survive” seminary by ignoring everything they don’t believe already. Therefore, although they have the “piece of paper”, they couldn’t have been bothered to stretch themselves, considering their singular experience in life as superior to the diversity that comes from lifelong students and worshipers of God from other sides of the fences. Still, I just don’t understand why some churches grow to be so narrow minded and shallow…

Regarding atheists: Descartes was called an atheist. It is because he pushed a little too hard on the church’s role in society. It wasn’t a question of belief in God, it was a question on belief in the church as God, hehe. Ooooh, you know who else bore the atheist nomiker? Christians. Yep. The pre-Constantinian Roman Empire called them “no-gods” because they rejected belief in the pantheon that was worshiped in Rome. So we see that atheists can sometimes be better Christians than the ones slinging the name… I am an A. I am an A-T. I am an A-T-H-E-I-S-T. And I have C-H-R-I-S-T in my H-E-A-R-T….

The following people have my mental hugs today…. Mike Story, Jason Crow, Jeff Swan

I was considering communion (read: Eucharist, Lord’s Supper) this morning and put some things together in rapid succession in my head, so I wrote them down on a bulletin.

Do we really understand what we are doing when we take communion? I assume (completely unscientifically) that most people would say, “remembering Jesus”.  And this is as good an answer as any. But is it close to the whole truth? You see, communion didn’t start with Jesus. It started long before. In Egypt.

In Egypt, we were slaves. Then God brought us out with a mighty show of power. The Passover.  Where the blood of an innocent lamb was spilled to show who we belong to. We baked bread with no leaven and ate with our sandals on. Leaven was a symbol of sin, and we kept sandals on to show we must be ready to leave at any moment when God called us. So we celebrate the passover every year to remember how God saved us from slavery. And every year, we renew our commitment to God and God’s people and our place in this story.

You would say, “Chad, I wasn’t there. God didn’t rescue me from Egypt. And I don’t celebrate Passover. Why did you keep saying we?”

That’s the whole point. We don’t say these things. We don’t celebrate passover. We don’t use words like “we” when we talk about this story. That is why we miss the point of communion so many times. Jesus was not eating “communion” or “the Lord’s supper” or “Eucharist” with his followers. He was celebrating Passover. All of the meaning that went into it and came out of it was born in the story of the first passover. Jesus and his disciples would have recounted the story, using “we” and “us”. They would have showed union with God’s people before them. God didn’t rescue their ancestors, God rescued THEM.

Jesus now said HE was the new lamb. HIS blood made the new covenant. The bread was HIM, no leaven. Jesus was not giving us a new story and ritual, he reinterpreted the old story, and gave it new meaning. So now, we look back at how God rescued US from slavery, how we eat “bread” without sin, and instead of sandals on, we have instead taken to washing feet that were dirty from the journey.

Some thoughts. Communion often is seen as “personal, Jesus and me time”. Of course, it can be that. And powerfully so. But closer to the older, truer, deeper meaning is the opposite. It is not personal time. It is renewing your place in the community of those redeemed by God. Thus, the word “communion”. Togetherness.

Bread: If possible, try for unleavened. The symbolism is too good not to.

The cup:  Wine is what Jesus used. It has antioxidants that are really good for you. It is a little bitter and a little sweet. Like the death of the lamb. And Christ. Juice is acceptable too, providing you come up with a better reason than, “alcohol is bad.