Jonah and the God who gets involved

I'm leading a three week bible study at my church Sunday mornings, and we're going through the book of Jonah. This last week, we were reading/discussing chapter one, and one of the women in attendance said that she didn't like that God created a storm to interrupt Jonah's "escape" from God's call. She mentioned some of the recent dialogue attributing storms like Sandy to "God's punishment against the wicked" and ended with "my God doesn't get involved like that."

(Before I go on, I want to make clear that I don't mean to belittle her comment or engagement with the story.  Her comment was wonderful in its openness and it greatly contributed to the discussion; I was grateful that she shared it with us.)

Now, I agree with her in that it angers me when Christian leaders decide they have an inside line to God and can discern God's hand in natural disasters. But, I disagree with her reasoning for getting there. It's not that I don't think God could cause storms to "punish the wicked," but rather that we have no business speaking about God in a way other than how God has made Godself known. God has chosen to remain hidden from us in things like storms and earthquakes so that God can be revealed to us in Jesus Christ. It is only God's self-revelation to us that authorizes our speech about God. If God did not come to us in Christ, we would simply have nothing to say.

 Now, God is revealed through scripture, which always points to the pinnacle of God's revelation in Jesus Christ. And God as shown in scripture does things like create storms in Jonah. The God of scripture is a God who gets involved, and often in ways we don't like. I'm reminded of the story of the man who had been blind from birth in John 9. The disciples ask Jesus who sinned that this man was born blind, since they assumed that an ailment like this must be punishment for someone's sin. Was it the man who somehow brought this on himself in the womb? Or was it that his parents sinned?  "Jesus answered, 'Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God’s works might be revealed in him.'" (John 9:3 NRSV)  Jesus' answer is surprising because, while it does deny this tragedy as a punishment for sin, it doesn't preclude God from being involved.  According to Jesus, this man's blindness is intended to serve God's purpose.

So, returning to events like the devastation wrought by Sandy on the east coast, it's not the case that we can assume that bad events happen to punish bad people, but neither can we assume that God is not involved.  The fact is that God has not chosen to reveal God's involvement (or lack thereof) in events like this, and therefore we have nothing to say.

I was thinking about this as I got ready this morning, and I found myself wondering what the woman at bible study would think about all of it.  I think probably her answer would be pretty much the same: "my God doesn't get involved like that."  That answer is wonderfully revealing: her God doesn't get involved like the God of the Bible does, which in biblical terminology, means that her god is an idol.

I don't mean to single her out.  The fact is, we are all idolaters.   Each of us has our own understanding of who God is and what God does, and I am convinced that all of our understandings err at one point or another.  All of us ultimately put our faith in an idol which we have constructed ourselves.  And of course, this is a problem because our idols cannot save us.  The false gods which we build for ourselves out of our needs, our desires--even our theologies!--cannot save us.  Only the true God can do that.

So, what hope do we idolaters have?

Finally, our only hope is this: that God (the True God) has determined to be our God and displace our idols. God promises to be God for us and against idols, as it says in the first "commandment:"  "You will have no other gods before me." (Exodus 20:3)  This is a command, sure, but it is also a promise.  God will be our God and we will have no other.  No idol that we create is able to keep us from the saving reach of this God who gets involved.  And that's very good news for us.

Sermon on The kingdom of God

Mark 4:26-32

The Parable of the Growing Seed

 He also said, ‘The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how. The earth produces of itself, first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head. But when the grain is ripe, at once he goes in with his sickle, because the harvest has come.’

The Parable of the Mustard Seed

 He also said, ‘With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs, and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.’

Brothers and sisters, grace to you and peace from God our father and the Lord Jesus Christ.  Amen.

          The kingdom of God is very important in all of the gospels, and it seems to be especially important for Mark; in fact, the first words that come out of the mouth of Jesus in Mark’s gospel are “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.”  The kingdom of God has come near.  This is “the good news of God,” that the kingdom of God is at hand.  But what does that mean?  What exactly is the kingdom of God?  How do we know it is here?  In answering this question, we tend to look for evidence of God’s kingdom, either outside in the world around us, or inside ourselves. 

When we look at the world, we look for evidence that the world is getting better, and in some ways it seems to be.  In the last hundred years, we have seen increasing equality in this country.  For example, in the women’s suffrage movement of the early part of the 20^th century and the civil rights movement of the 50s and 60s.  Worldwide, the harsh colonialism of the west has been largely dismantled and several longstanding and oppressive dictators have been ousted through the liberation movements of the “Arab Spring.”  But as we look around, we can’t help but see that things aren’t all coming up roses.  The 20^th century saw some of the deadliest atrocities committed in the history of humankind.  The economic crisis which began in 2008 has revealed the tremendous inequality of the distribution of this nation’s wealth.  What’s more, many of the successes of the Arab spring have given way to more turmoil and violence, rather than bringing peace and justice.  It doesn’t seem like the kingdom of God is at hand. 

So, when we give up on finding the kingdom of God in the world around us, we turn inward to find it in ourselves.  We tell ourselves that the kingdom of God isn’t of this world; it doesn’t consist of governments or laws.  The kingdom of God is found in the people of God, after all.  So, as good Lutherans in Lent, we hunker down and examine ourselves.  On some days it seems that God moving in us and using us.  On other days it seems there’s no way he could be present in such corruption.  Most days we really can’t tell, if we think about it at all.  But remember that verse from the beginning of Mark.  Jesus proclaims: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.”  Since Jesus proclaims that the kingdom of God is here, so must I. 

So here I am to tell you, the kingdom of God is indeed at hand.  It is here, now, in this very room with us.  It is in us, it is all around us, there is no escaping it.  And let me tell you something else; you are not worthy of it.  I'm not worthy of it.  We haven't properly prepared for it.  We don't have what it takes.  You don't have to take a very long look at yourself to realize that you've fallen short.  I'm not even sure I was ever really headed in the right direction.  I've always found the pull of my own self-interest practically irresistible.  So here we are, trying to figure out how we can bring about the kingdom of God in such a corrupt world, trying to figure out how to get over our selfishness and live into that kingdom—frankly, it seems hopeless.  But in our hopelessness, Jesus breaks in and tells us it’s already here.  It’s not about being prepared, no, it’s already here.  How can we make sense of it?  The kingdom is here?  Really?  I can’t see it, I’m certainly not living like it’s here, and as far as I can tell, neither is anyone else.  I mean, certainly that is what Paul means when he says “There is no one who is righteous, not even one.”  So what nonsense is this that the kingdom of God is at hand?

          In our gospel reading today, Jesus gives us two pictures of the kingdom of God that may help.  First, Jesus tells us that the kingdom of God is like seeds that are scattered on the ground.  Nobody tends them, yet still they grow up. “First the stalk, then the head, and then the full grain in the head,” and finally they are harvested, just as they were always meant to be.  Apparently, the kingdom of God comes despite our poor and inadequate tending of it.  Then Jesus gives us another picture:  the kingdom is like that mustard seed, a tiny speck of a seed.  But when it grows up it becomes the greatest of all shrubs.  Now, a shrub may not be what we had envisioned for ourselves, but it is what God has envisioned for us, and he knows better than any of us what our purpose is.  This shrub, as unimpressive as it may be, provides shade and shelter for the birds of the air.  It stretches itself to provide safe space for others.  While we want something more like the tall and proud cedars of Lebanon, God knows better.  God aims to keep us humble, constantly giving and receiving ourselves in community.

          So, what do we do now?  Now that we have some idea of what God’s kingdom is like, are we to bring it about?  Are we to grow ourselves and each other into the kind of people God wants us to be?  Well, no.  We’re terrible gardeners.  The more we focus on ourselves, the less we are fit to be in the kingdom of God, and we only make things worse the harder we try.  There is nothing we can do to bring this growth about.

So do we just sit and wait?  No, because instead of leaving you here in your helplessness.  Jesus comes to you.  He comes to you through the good gifts of creation, the warmth of the sun, the grain of the fields, the love of friends, family and even strangers. He comes to you through the waters of baptism, through the bread and the wine.  He comes to you in the words of Holy Scriptures, and in the words I am speaking to you right now.  He comes to you and he gives you something.  Something stronger and better and more sure than anything in all creation.  He gives you a promise.  He makes you a promise.  He tells you that he has chosen you.  You are destined for the kingdom.  Jesus Christ himself has claimed you, without asking permission or waiting for you to be good enough.  No, he took charge and planted a seed of faith inside of you.  And as you sleep and rise night and day, the seed sprouts and grows, whether you know it or not.  This seed is tiny, insignificant, undetectable even.  But it's there, even when it seems it isn't.  But Jesus doesn't stop there.  He is promising you even more than that.  He doesn't just leave it at a seed.  He tells you that tiny, insignificant seed will blossom and grow and stretch out its branches.  It will even provide shelter for others to make nests in its shade.  But you don't have to wait for some far off day in the future when the growth is finally complete.  No, God made you a promise, and the promises of God are more real and more certain than anything else.  As Paul says: "I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ."  This is no far off, future reality.  By the work of Jesus Christ, God has brought that reality to you now.  The kingdom of God is at hand.  Through faith in God's promise, you are there.  You have arrived.  Now you can go out and spread your branches.  You are free, completely and totally.  There is no longer anything to fear, for you have in your possession the most real thing.  There is nothing that can stop you now.  You can provide shelter for each other without fear, you can rely on each other when you are weak, you can carry this promise that is now your reality out into the world, to those who so desperately need to hear it.  Instead of worrying about bringing the kingdom into the world or yourself, you are now free to simply be the kingdom as the body of Christ.  That is your identity; it is who you are.  That is what God created you to be.  And God always gets his way.   Amen.

Bayer contra Barth, part 3

See part 1 here and part 2 here.

On Natural Theology/Unity of Reality:

       “In the service of the church, natural theology serves to articulate the universality of the gospel, which is to be proclaimed not only to all people, but also to all creatures (Mark 16:15).  Jesus is the one and only Lord.  'There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among mortals by which we must be saved' (Acts 4:12).This might seem to suggest that we should think of the person of Christ as the unity of reality or, conversely, of the unity of reality as the person of Christ, based on such key texts as the New Testament Christ-hymns, for example, Colossians 1:15-20, Hebrews 1:1-4, and the prologue of the Gospel of John.  It is in this sense that especially Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Karl Barth have asserted that Jesus Christ is the one Word of God.  But in order to demonstrate its claim to truth or its claim to general theological validity, we do not have to begin with an indeterminate, general concept, which would have to be assumed or anticipated, but rather with the particularity of the Christ event….  

If we look to history for examples of a 'pure' [a priori] Christological argument, we could take Hegel’s philosophy of religion, with some modifications, but we also need to look at Karl Barth.  We recall that Barth’s initial treatment of the problem of natural theology resulted in his outright rejection of it with his famous 'No!' to Emil Brunner in 1943.  But then in 1961 Barth says, 'Later I retrieved natural theology via Christology.'  Therefore, we must examine his natural theology, which he rehabilitated on the basis of Christology, because of its connections with Hegel’s philosophy of religion…  

With Hegel, the way pioneered by Lessing and Kant reaches its completion.  The cross becomes 'rational' in that the historical Good Friday is understood as an idea and so is transformed into the speculative Good Friday, while Christ’s resurrection becomes the negation of negation.  The concrete attributes (concreta) of the being of Jesus Christ are tacitly transformed into abstract attributes (abstracta), into general definitions that delineate reality as a whole and as a unity. 

In the new form of natural theology perfected by Hegel after Lessing and Kant, the old distinction between theology [a general experience of God] and economy [a Christian experience of salvation] is set aside and transformed into the one reality of Christ.  Dietrich Bonhoeffer, speaking wholly in the sense of the Hegelian philosophy of religion, says: 'There is…only one reality, and that is the reality of God, manifest in Christ, in the reality of the world.'  Karl Barth says the same thing, theologically, especially in his 'doctrine of lights' in Church Dogmatics IV/3.  Responding there to the problem endemic to the tradition of natural theology, he says that he retrieves 'natural theology via Christology' on the basis of Jesus Christ as the one Word of God…. 

While the distinction between Schleiermacher and Barth may be ever so great, they agree with each other in their thinking about unity.  While Schleiermacher, of course, thinks of unity anthropologically, as the one fundamental state [the feeling of absolute dependence], Barth approaches it Christologically, by holding that Jesus Christ is the one Word of God….  

If we criticize Barth’s thinking about unity, we will have to ask ourselves whether the unity of God is something that we can only confess, as when we confess Jesus to be the one and only Lord, or whether it is something that we can also conceive with our minds.  But this can happen only in the sense of 1 Corinthians 8:4-6 and of the prayer of the Isaiah Apocalypse: ‘O Lord our God, other lords besides you have ruled over us, but we acknowledge your name alone’ (Isa. 26:13; cf Micah 4:5)  Yahweh's lawsuit with the other gods must not be glossed over even by systematic theology through an abstract monism. At stake is the truth of the first commandment: 'I am the Lord your God, you shall have no other gods besides me!' Nevertheless, the other gods have their reality in their promises and enticements, as either something fascinating or frightening, in the sense of a power that is given to them by the human fabricating heart. 

The unity of God that we confess can only be believed.  It cannot be conceived, if that means to possess the idea of the unity of God as a datum that we could summon at will as we do our hopes and memories…. God’s unity is not like an idea that can be remembered or construed.  It will always be a matter of dispute.  Even thinking cannot escape this conflict between the one God with the many gods.  Therefore, this situation must be made clear also in thinking and in theology, especially in systematic theology.  We cannot skip over the distinction between law and gospel, which is at stake here, for the sake of the idea of the unity of gospel and law.” (p 192-198) 

“…God encounters us in ways that are irreducibly different.  [These are Law (accusation and instruction), Gospel (promise), and terrifying hiddenness (which contradicts Law and Gospel).]  We cannot therefore accept a monistic doctrine of the word of God, as advocated by Karl Barth.  In the midst of the contradictory and complementary ways in which God encounters us, which are laden with tension and conflict, the gospel stands out in its uniqueness as God’s decisive, final word.” (p.125) 

“The danger of an ethical approach to theology exists wherever the unity of law and gospel is stressed for the sake of truth.  We find this, for instance, in Karl Barth.” (p. 142) 

“In this sense ‘the Holy Spirit,’ who makes the old world and its old language new, ‘has his own grammar.’…  The formulas of the new language are a gift of the Holy Spirit.  They focus on the way we talk about the communication of attributes.  We must, however, protect them against rash generalizations, the work of enthusiastic eschatology, aided and abetted by human reason.  Again, Luther achieves this by thoroughly philosophical means: through the distinction between the concrete attributes (concreta) of Christ’s being and the abstract attributes (abstracta) of human nature in general, creation and the world as such.  Luther stresses the importance of this distinction, which seems to anticipate the criticism that is necessary today in the face of a post-Christian natural theology, with its distinctively Hegelian stamp, which dominates, for instance, the theology of Barth and Bonhoeffer.  The hallmark of these forms of post-Christian theology is the endless and lavish use they make of the proposition 'God is human' or 'the creature and the creator are one and the same.'  However, in what is surely a countermove to this, Luther pleads for a 'spare use' of this kind of talk.  The thesis that 'all words receive a new meaning in Christ' is not true if we expand it in a speculative way, but only 'if they have the same referent.'  People who do not see this clearly and who fail to distinguish between the concrete attributes of Christ’s being and the abstract attributes of humanity and the world, 'do not know how to distinguish between equivocal words.'  In their enthusiasm, they relish the fog of equivocation and refuse to let the cloud (Exod. 13:21f.) of the Holy Spirit and his grammar be their guide.” (p. 81-82, quotes from Luther)

I must admit, I don't fully understand everything that Bayer is advocating here, and I'm not sure I even agree with everything, but here's some of what I take away from it.  God speaks to us in Law and Gospel and encounters us in his hiddenness.  To try and subsume these very different types of relation under one broad category of God's self-revelation in Christ (as Barth does, I believe) is to eliminate the conflict that makes theology so dynamic and powerful over us.  Once these disparate relations are "united," theology becomes something dead which we have control over, rather than how the living God encounters us.  The Law tells us that we are damned, the Gospel tells us that we are redeemed.  Most conflicting of all, the suffering around us tell us nothing of God.  This is God's hiddenness.  When we try and peel back the mask with which God has hidden his face (Psalm 13), we are led into terrifying depersonalized abstractions which threaten to undo us.  Once we relegate God's unity to the status of a datum, we "save" ourselves from God's work.  It is the old self resisting the cross, trying to "get God off our back," to quote Forde.

This concludes Bayer's disagreement with Barth.  I know I need help unpacking all of this, still, so what do you think?  Let me know in the comments and maybe we can work through this together.

Bayer contra Barth, part 2

See part 1 here.

On the Scheme of Theory and Practice:

“The twofold scheme serves as a basic model right up to our own day.  An impressive example of this is the motto of Taizé: contemplation et lutte, ‘prayer and engagement.’…The Roman Catholic tradition has at its best maintained the twofold scheme up to the present in the sense of Meister Eckhart’s dialectic [that practice must be adopted in such a way that it does not exclude theory].  Karl Barth has also followed this twofold scheme in his strongly cognitive and contemplative understanding of faith, which of course is connected to the modern emphasis on construction.  However, this scheme, together with the Platonic-Aristotelian concept of science that always goes with it, was dealt a fatal blow by Luther’s concept of theology.  For him, faith is no longer subordinated to theory, but it is a unique and distinctive kind of life, a receptive life (vita passiva).  Theory and practice are no longer related to each other in a two-fold way.  Rather, both are related to faith, and it is this third element that determines whether they are true or false.” (p. 109) 

         “Festivals and holidays (holy days) make harsh demands on the old nature, for it means that we must cease from our work: ‘For our sinful nature is very unwilling to die and to be passive, and it is a bitter day of rest for it to cease from its own works and be dead.’  This has been a bitter pill for modern theological anthropology, right up to the theology of Barth and Bultmann, in which humans are always seen as active subjects, as doers (for Barth analogously to God)…. However, this overlooks the power of the Sabbath, of Sunday, to establish life, because on the Lord’s day human work ceases and God is active.  If we receive this power as a categorical gift, the urge to realize ourselves, not only in our work but also in our actions, even in the act of faith, must die…        

This kind of dying, however, makes room for life: ‘Keep hand and heart from labor free, that God may do his work in thee. (Lutheran Hymn)’…  Faith, of course, is nothing but ‘a divine work in us which changes us and makes us to be born anew of God, John 1 [12-13].  It kills the old Adam and makes us altogether new persons, in heart and spirit and mind and powers.’If it is true that we must rest from our work, die to the old self, to let God do his work, faith is primarily neither theory nor practice, neither a speculative life (vita contemplativa) nor an active life (vita activa), but, to use Luther’s term for it, a receptive life (vita passiva).” (p. 92-93, quotes from Luther)

Since Aristotle, discussion of science as an academic discipline has involved the distinction between theory and practice.  Theology has largely remained in this scheme throughout its history.  Bayer proposes that to remain within the scheme of theory and practice, of speculation and activity, is to succomb to the temptation to justify one's self and neglect the importance of faith, which is neither theory nor practice but something separate which God does to us.  Theory and practice are merely the outgrowth of that faith as it is challenged and seeks to establish itself.  Theology should not concern itself with striking the proper balance between theory and practice, but rather it should rest and be captured by God's work which kills and makes alive.

Bayer contra Barth, part 1

Since my inclusion of Karl Barth in my last post is generating some disagreement, and I am not knowledgeable enough to defend Bayer's critiques sufficiently, I am going to try and let Bayer speak for himself.  In reviewing where Bayer discusses Barth in his book, I have seen three primary criticisms.  The first is the program of "faith seeking understanding," the second is the classic scheme of theory and practice, and the third (by far the most in-depth) is Barth's "rehabilitation" of natural theology and its "unity of meaning."  Since the passages (particularly in the third critique) are long, I am dividing these up into three posts.

(Unless otherwise noted, quotes are from Oswald Bayer's Theology the Lutheran Way.)

On Fides Quaerens Intellectum:

       “What do we pray for as we journey along the pathway of theology?  What are we seeking when we pray it?  Assuming that we already have faith, are we asking for insight, along the lines of Anselm’s program of “faith seeking understanding” (fides quaerens intellectum)?  Luther emphasizes that the author of the psalm (the pray-er) asks to be instructed and taught, even though he would have been well acquainted with the text of Moses and the other books, and would have heard and read them daily.  Here we come to a difference which is crucial for Luther’s understanding of theology.  The theologian should try to understand through prayer what he or she already knows.
       What the theologian does not yet know and is still seeking is not knowledge and insights into texts.  Therefore, it is not a matter of discovering what a text is saying with the aid of grammar, rhetoric, and dialectics (logic and philosophy in the wider sense) in order to be able to teach it in the school or academy.  For that, of course, "knowledge of the liberal arts" is necessary, and Luther stresses its importance for the study of theology as much as the "grace of the Spirit."  Although the work of the Holy Spirit, and therefore of the triune God to whom we pray, does not depend on human achievement and education, it does not exclude “knowledge of the liberal arts.”  The “grace of the Spirit” does not replace “knowledge of the liberal arts”; it sets it free.  In this way, prayer and work, God’s work and human work, find their proper relationship.  Theology as a human project is relieved of the need to reach above, to go in search of timeless pure principles, the absolute first and last, and to be enraptured by it in a pure vision.  Humans do not have to justify themselves by their knowledge any more than by their actions… What this learning receives and attains beyond what it knows is the certainty of what it knows, a certainty that cannot be given by knowledge and science.  This certainty is not within our power to create or possess.  We can only seek it and wait for it from him alone through prayer.” (p. 48-49) 

“Theology, then, is a way of life that is stamped by prayer, the study of scripture, and spiritual attack (oratio, meditatio, tentatio).  And to this we can also add death.  By the same token, the theologian – and every Christian is a theologian – is a person under attack seeking certainty (tentatus quaerens certitudinem).  This formula, which picks up Anselm’s programmatic formula and turns it inside out, illustrates the difference between Luther and Anselm in their understanding of theology.”  (p. 212)  

“Despite some points of contact, this formula represents a clear alternative to the program of ‘faith seeking understanding’ (fides quaerens intellectum) that has dominated theology from Augustine through Anselm to Hegel…and Karl Barth.  In contrast to the program of ‘faith seeking understanding,’ Luther’s formula takes into account the historical nature of theological existence, and gives due recognition to the fundamental importance of temptation (tentatio)….  Luther’s approach does not arbitrarily impose a general, a priori condition that makes possible the understanding of the gospel.  Rather it teaches us how meditation, and the use of the inexhaustible treasures of the Bible, can be a source of new experiences.”  (p. 34)

These three quotes illustrate a fundamental difference between Bayer (and Luther) and perhaps the majority of theological thinking throughout the history of the church, including Barth.  Fides quaerens intellectum (faith seeking understanding) sees the Christian life in more-or-less this way:  first, the Holy Spirit gives faith to the sinner, who then uses this grace to find out more about this faith.  In this picture, which is purely intellectual and lacking in emotion, the christian is seen as the do-er of theology.  Theology is a somewhat neutral enterprise, insofar as its effects on the christian are concerned.  Bayer's formula of tentatus quaerens certitudinem (a person under attack seeking certainty) paints a very different picture.  While both view faith as the gift of the Holy Spirit, Bayer's formula does not show understanding as the goal of theology, but rather a strong faith.  The christian finds her faith under attack by life events, the challenges of skeptics and the seeming absence of God, and laments, reaching to God for salvation: "How long will you hide your face from me?" (Psalm 13).  Bayer takes into account that God uses suffering to kill the old self and raise the new and that this is by no means an emotionally-neutral enterprise.  In this formula, God is the do-er of theology, not the christian.

The Death of Idols

Edit:  When discussing a "theology of the cross," "the cross" is shorthand for the entire story of Jesus, from OT anticipation to birth to crucifixion, resurrection, and glorification.
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I read this post over at Theology Out of Bounds, in which the author makes the case that monotheism (asserting the existence of only one god) is unbiblical.  He argues that the faith of Israel and of the early church was not so much monotheistic as it was monolatrous (monolatry: serving only one god regardless of the existence of others).  It reminded me of a passage from Oswlad Bayer's Theology the Lutheran Way and I thought I'd walk through it a bit.

Bayer is talking about the relation of philosophy (especially natural theology) to biblical theology and the attempt to unify them by what he calls "justifying thinking."  The attempts to do this can go two ways.  First, as in the case of the medieval scholastic theologians, it can start from abstract, general, rational truths derived purely from logic and try to end up with Christianity.  This approach starts with something like the god of Plato (omnibenevolent, omniscient, immutable, omnipotent, etc.) and moves to show how the god of the Bible is this god.  It tries to build a foundation of logic and then add revelation on top of it.  The second approach is more recent and finds proponents in Bonhoeffer and Barth.  This method begins with God's self-revelation and works from there to arrive at abstract, general, rational truths.  To Bayer, both of these approaches suffer from the same flaw: they both sacrifice the concrete revelation of God for the sake of general, abstract truths.

The temptation to engage in justifying thinking is especially strong for a systematic theologian, for this kind of thinking develops the idea of a "unity" of reality.  Justifying thinking is preoccupied with the desire to mediate and reconcile all things. It is driven by the compulsion to demonstrate that every individual and particular thing is based on something general...

As humans, we are driven to justify ourselves, both with our thinking and our actions.  By trying to find something that unifies human endeavors with God's revelation, we look to justify ourselves before God in our thinking.  It's not really any different than the person who acts morally in order to earn their way to heaven.  It's all part of the same motivation: Sin.  Sin causes us to try and show ourselves to be worthy, rather than accepting the entirely free gift of God.  This has to be eliminated, and the only way for that to happen is through the cross.  We have to die to ourselves.  God has to kill the "theologian of glory" (the person whose theology is captivated by the need to reserve some glory for humanity) to leave the "theologian of the cross" (the person whose theologies of glory have been broken and who realizes that all remains is the cross).

Insofar as metaphysics is justifying thinking, which is in league with morality in the sense of justifying action, it is put to death by the passive, donated righteousness of faith. The person who is reborn a Christian and a theologian through the word of the cross and is a "theologian of the cross" says what a thing is: "A theologian of glory calls evil good and good evil. A theologian of the cross calls a thing what it actually is. (Heidelberg Disputation)" Why is that so? People by nature have their own natural idea of God, in which they flatten everything out to make it fit the concept of the One, the True, the Beautiful, and the Good. But the theologian of the cross has had that false idea of God shattered through painful disillusionment.

The death of the old self therefore also means that our illusion of a totality of meaning is destroyed, even if it was only hypothetically anticipated. Humans have a deep-seated need to engage in justifying thinking. But the theologian of the cross recognizes in this the "thinking and striving of the human heart," which is radically evil (Gen. 6:5 and 8:21). In its justifying thinking the human heart is a "fabricating" heart that constantly produces and projects images in the mind, idols, on which we hang our hearts, archetypes, prototypes, hopes of happiness and success. Each of us has such images on which we hang our heart, which the heart itself has produced. Therefore, Calvin, luke Luther, says that the human heart is an "idol factory."

And there it is: the conception of God as "the One, the True, the Beautiful, and the Good"-- this is an idol created by the human heart!  The search for a "totality of meaning" which can incorporate both our human reasoning and divine revelation (even if it is based in Christology, as in Barth) is just a symptom of our "fabricating heart!"  When we talk about the "one God" in the sense of monotheism, we gloss over the way he is presented in scripture.  The "God" of philosophy ends up usurping the God of revelation.  Bayer gives an example of this in the translation of God's name:

...this question was raised by the Greek form of the Hebrew name of God in the [Greek translation of the Hebrew Scripture].  God's name in Hebrew has a verbal form that can be taken as a reliable promise that God is freely present with us: I am/will be who I am/will be (Exod. 3:14).  [There is no real tense in Biblical Hebrew, so 'ehyeh can mean both "I am" and "I will be."]  However, in Greek this dynamic is lost and the divine name is petrified into the self-predication of an absolute being: ego eimi ho on [lit. "I am the one who is" or "I am the being"] (where "on" is the word in Greek metaphysics for "being").

In Greek thinking, immortality, the absence of emotion and its accompanying impassibility (apathy), all belong to being, pure and simple, to being itself.  However, where the biblical texts are taken seriously, there will be a grave conflict with Greek metaphysics and ontology.  The event described in Hosea 11:7-11 is ontologically unthinkable.  Ancient metaphysics rejects it as mythology because it cannot abide the thought that there is a "coup," a change in God himself.  Here God is not identical with himself; he is not consistent with himself: "...My heart is changed within me, I am full of remorse. (9) I will not execute my fierce anger; I will not again destroy Ephraim; for I am God and no mortal...."

Clearly, there is a strong tension between theology and philosophy that we cannot minimize or even try to harmonize.

When we think in terms of metaphysics, of some abstract, rational reality behind the presented reality, we are in danger of forgetting that God is a "living God" and not an abstract ideal.  God is not some generic "being" or  abstract emotion; he is a personal, living and active God, and he does things we hate.  To shield ourselves from this terrifying God, we create theories to set up idols so that we can have control.  Essentially, we set up gods that are lesser than God so that we can leave some room for our own freedom, our own morality, our own justification.  We can't help it.  We are in bondage to Sin and so we can't let God be God.  The only answer to this is the word of the Cross: the promise of death and new life, freely given by a God who we can't control and who won't submit to our quest for a "totality of meaning."  The theologian of glory must die so that the theologian of the cross can be raised.

On Vocation

I'm working on another already-too-long blog post and I realized that it needs some context on how the Lutheran understanding of vocation differs from what seems to be the prevailing view.  So rather than try and fit it into the other post, I've decided to do it separately.

Let's start by looking at the way I think most people think about vocation.  The word for vocation comes from the Latin word vocare, which means 'to call,' so it's fair to associate vocation with calling.  The way I had always been taught to think of vocation was as something akin to my life's grand purpose, the one thing that all else in my life should help me accomplish.  This could be something like owning a business, making a better life for my children, becoming involved in missions work, etc.  In a Christian context, it is the one big thing to which God is calling you, and only you.  A very large part of the talk about vocation while I was at Whitworth was focused on discerning our vocation; trying to figure out "where our greatest joy meets the world's greatest need."

While I don't think there is anything strictly wrong about this way of thinking about vocation, I do think it is incomplete.  Here's how Lutherans talk about vocation:

Lutherans tend to talk more about our many vocations than about one big overriding calling, and this can be confusing to someone who is used to thinking about vocation in the way described above.  In Lutheranism, our vocations are understood to be our roles in life.  So, to use myself as an example, some of my vocations are: husband, son, brother, friend, neighbor, blog writer, student, therapist, etc.  Because of my belief in the sovereignty of God, the very fact that I find myself in these roles tells me that God has called me to them.  This doesn't mean that vocation can't be understood to mean the "big" roles that we aspire to, but it isn't limited to that.  I, for example, have been following a call to pastoral ministry for nearly ten years now, and I certainly consider that to be my vocation, but it is only one of many, even if it is a very important one.

There's a couple advantages that I see to the Lutheran understanding of vocation over the prevailing view, and they both have to do with inclusivity.  First, this understanding of vocation includes all of our roles in life, which allows us to recognize God's call over the whole of our life, rather than in just one aspect.  Instead of being so consumed with preparing myself for some future grand purpose, I am called back into the present to do the work set out for me right now.

Second, this understanding of vocation includes everyone in a way that the prevailing view doesn't.  While speaking about the big thing you're going to do in the world may be entirely appropriate when speaking to a group of college students, many don't think of their lives this way.  Many people aren't going to have one overriding calling in their life that will be publicly acknowledged as such.  If we talk about vocation only as the one big thing we need to do, as the grand impact we're going to have on the world, then many will succumb to the myth that a life without a publicly recognizable achievement was a life not worth living.  If we only talk about some big capital "V" Vocation, then we imply that the mailman or the janitor are failing human beings or are somehow worth less than the CEO or the pastor or the politician.  Not only does talking this way devalue people in their professions, but within the church it puts pressure on people to "be better Christians" or some such nonsense by working for the church or going overseas instead of letting them focus on the place they are at, the place where God has put them.

Now I'm sure that my professors at Whitworth had the best intentions in talking about vocation in the way they did and, as I said earlier, it may have even been appropriate given the audience, but I think that a move to the understanding of vocation I have put forward would be beneficial for a lot of people.

What do you think?  Does this seem to cheapen the idea of vocation as you've understood it?  Enrich it?  Let me know in the comments.