Acts and Afterlife, Hope and Gospel

Recently a friend online posted this quote:

"In all of the evangelistic sermons in the Book of Acts, none of them makes an appeal to afterlife issues. If you cannot preach the gospel without an appeal to afterlife issues (heaven and hell), you cannot preach the gospel like the Apostles." --Brian Zahnd

From what I know of Zahnd— and that’s not more than a cursory glance because he has not really piqued my interest— it seems like he is not really into recovering the New Testament Church as part of his project. In fact, from what I can remember, he seems to think the New Testament and Old Testament are problematic in important ways (and on some points I agree). But, if this is the case, why tell anyone to evangelize more like the Apostles did? If the Apostles were fundamentally flawed in several ways, why should we look to them as a template about how to evangelize?

Wittgenstein and Hope beyond hope

Recently a friend of mine posted a neat quote by Wittgenstein:

One can imagine an animal angry, fearful, sad, joyful, startled. But hopeful? And why not? A dog believes his master is at the door. But can he also believe that his master will come the day after tomorrow? —And what can he not do here? —How do I do it? — What answer am I supposed to give to this?Can only those hope who can talk? Only those who have mastered the use of language? That is to say, the manifestations of hope are modifications of this complicated form of life. (Ludwig Wittgenstein, “Philosophy of Psychology — a Fragment,” i.)

Love and Apocalypse

There appears to be a contradiction 

Between

"Love one another

As I have loved you"

And

"He will come again in glory

To Judge the living and dead"

How do we resolve the yawning chasm

Between Love

And Apocalypse?

Anyone who has ever truly loved

Sacrificially loved

Loved despite the odds

Despite the failures

Despite the future

Anyone who has loved like that

Like Jesus loved

Will tell you that Love brings an apocalypse

Love does not sooth

Nor lull to sleep

It rends apart space and time

To reveal the reality behind the masks

The disease behind the smile

And that kind of Love

Pisses people off

Causes fear and hatred

And can even get you crucified

Love will struggle

Love IS Apocalypse

Love brings the old world to an end

And gives birth to a new world

We never could have imagined.

 

Easter and the philosophy of embodiment and matter

Around Easter, I was in another discussion about the necessity of the resurrection for the hope proclaimed in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. There is a perpetual tension I find between people who believe two different kinds of things about the hope that the Gospel, or "Good News of Jesus", offers us for the end of physical life. The first cluster of ideas is that a general faith in personal existence after death is sufficient for the Gospel, and all we need to affirm is that "we go to heaven when we die". The second cluster of ideas is that the Gospel entails a much more particular hope that in Christ we will be resurrected and re-embodied in a New Creation at the end of all things. I trend strongly toward the second cluster of ideas for both Biblical reasons and the philosophical implications of resurrection for full human flourishing.

Is Love stronger than hate?

The LORD appeared to us in the past, saying: “I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have drawn you with loving devotion." (Jeremiah 31.3)

Jesus said: "When I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw everyone to myself." (John 12.32)

Some have wondered what will win in the end: God's Love or human sin and hatred. Hate from a finite being is by definition, finite hate. Love from an infinite Being is by definition, infinite Love. The quantitative and qualitative difference between finite and infinite is by definition, infinite. Therefore God’s Love is infinitely more powerful and persuasive than even the greatest amount of finite hate, and that infinite Love will not give up or let down until it has, after ages of ages, transformed all finite hate into infinite Love. 

What the hell is Hell?

This is a 2007 two-part attempt at presenting theology as a dramatic discussion inspired by Peter Kreeft, Bryan McLaren, and Roger Olson. I have not re-visited it in years because it is almost impossible to NOT sound preachy. Nevertheless, Part 1 "Tiptoeing through the TULIP" is a helpful exposition of my Soteriology, and Part 2 "What the hell is Hell?" is a helpful exposition of my Eschatology.

Here in Part 2 we continue a discussion about salvation, particularly what heaven and hell are, and who goes to each. Our characters represent the views of particular Christian traditions about salvation. 

God is...

The undeconstructable Love 

Which shines as a Light 

In the darkness

Calling us to unfurl 

Beckoning us to grow 

Into our fullest and best selves

Christ is Risen: An Ancient Easter Song

This is one of my favorite meditations on the power of the Resurrection and the meaning of Easter, from 17 centuries ago.

When Words Fail

How both Theistic and Nontheistic language fails to describe Ultimate Reality

In the constant back and forth between Theists and Nontheists, one of the frequent criticisms hurled from both sides regards the problem of language. Both sides claim that that other side slides into nonsensical or tautological language that fails to say anything about Reality. At some point, each side gets to ideas that are so foundational, so axiological, to their interpretive framework, that all they can say is "it is what it is".

What is interesting to me is that this point of linguistic "no return" is precisely at the same point and regarding the same issues. This break in meaningful, non-tautological language happens precisely at the ultimate origin, the ultimate value, and the ultimate destiny of all things. At these three points both the Theist and the Nontheist are effectively reduced to silence. This is when our words fail: When we lack the ability and even the concepts necessary to describe the ultimate nature of the Reality we find ourselves in.

That All Shall Be Saved: Great Theology in Good Literature

I thought I would end 2019 with hope: A review of the book “That All Shall Be Saved: Heaven, Hell, and Universal Salvation” by Orthodox Theologian David Bentley Hart. This book was given to me this Christmas by a dear friend who had challenged me to expand my view of God's grace and Christ's atonement back in 2005. At that time we were reading Emerging Church authors such as Brian McLaren and Rob Bell, who were flirting with the idea that Christ would eventually save everyone who ever lived. I had first encountered hints of this idea in CS Lewis and George MacDonald, but I was still a Skeptical Universalist: I believed Christ could save all, but probably wouldn't. But, upon pondering these things deeply, and learning about the doctrine of Apokatastasis found in many of the earliest Christian theologians from Origen to Gregory of Nyssa to Julian of Norwich, I became a Hopeful Universalist: Christ could save all, and probably would save all. Upon reading this book by Hart, I think I have shifted once more. I am now a Convinced Universalist: The Good News is that God will save and heal all things in Christ.

The reason why I have evolved from being skeptical to hopeful to convinced comes from the central problem that Hart's book wrestles with. And that problem centers around the vision of God we find revealed in the person of Jesus Christ:

The Harrowing of Hell

A Lovecraftian incantation of Hope to banish dark enchantments. A poem for my son who enjoys reading Lovecraft and Poe and creating stories about things that go bump in the night.

Begin with the End in mind?

To begin with the end in mind: This was an ideal of Christian ethics long before it was a catch phrase for design thinking, an axiom of corporate management culture, or a technique for scientific application. Although many Christians have forgotten this, much to our detriment and the world’s. 

A Provocation on missing the point of the Prophets

It has been years since I have read through the Hebrew prophets continuously. On this read through it strikes me that the “standard” American interpretation of these texts is almost perfectly engineered to get people to miss the point of the prophets. (Engineered by whom or what? This is a great question!) This “standard” interpretation is to treat the prophets as some cryptic road map to a mythic future “end times” scenario. This places our attention in the future, rather than God’s action, and our responsibility, in the present. 

Can Cattle Breeding trigger the Apocalypse?

A friend recently sent me an article with the overblown and click-baity title of "Birth of first red heifer in 2000 years fulfills Bible prophecy and signals end of days". He asked me what I thought about this. In reply, I told him I’m probably the most un-fun Bible scholar to play this game with. 

This absurd article is based on an obscure read of Numbers 19 where it says “This is a requirement of the law that the Lord has commanded:  Tell the Israelites to bring you a red heifer without defect or blemish and that has never been under a yoke. …  This will be a lasting ordinance both for the Israelites and for the aliens living among them.” [verses 1–2, 10] 

Some sects of fundamentalist Christians interpret it this way: Jesus cannot return until the Third Temple is built in Jerusalem; The Third Temple cannot function unless there are Red Heifers to sacrifice there; Therefore if and when a Red Heifer is born, it will trigger the building of the Third Temple, which will trigger the return of Jesus. Don't blame me for the logical holes in this: I'm just reporting what a subsection of a subsection of a subsection of Christians believe. 

Here are some of the many reasons why this interpretation is problematic...

Credo: The Story that Reads Us [A Mini-Systemic Theology]

This was originally written in 2006 in partial fulfillment of requirements for Systematic Theology at Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University. It is fairly representative of my current thought, although in several ways I have built on, or superseded, what is written here. This is especially true in matters dealing with Science, World Religions, and Socio-Economic Justice.

This is the FULL 18,000 word original version that was trimmed to around 10,000 words to be turned in. Note that all endnotes have been removed from this version, due to the limitations of the blog format. However, all sources cited and consulted are found at the end of the essay.

A Prayer: Lord Jesus Christ, send forth your Spirit that I may say what needs to be said, in space allowed, and bear witness fully to your Father's Glory and His Story which writes us all. Amen+

Praying Psalm 87 for Jerusalem

With the ongoing unrest in Jerusalem between Israelis and Palestinians, I have struggled to find a prayer to pray for them. Both sides are wrong. Both sides are right. Both sides have performed atrocities. Both sides deserve a safe and prosperous place to live. But how to pray through this on any given day is extremely difficult.

So, over the last few years I have found myself praying Psalm 87. It is a beautiful vision of Jerusalem (i.e. Zion in this Psalm), in which the City is the epicenter of God's blessing upon all peoples. Zion is elected by God as the chosen City, that it may draw all peoples into those blessings and bring them a genuine relationship with the Living God. God's election is never an election to privilege, but an election to use one's privilege to share God's blessings with all.

CHART: What Happens after death? Three Christian Views

The following is a chart I developed for teaching the three basic hypotheses that Christians have held for what happens in the "intermediate state" between Earthly life and final resurrection. Please note that the distinctly Christian Hope is NOT that we live in Heaven forever after we die. The distinctively Christian Hope is that in the End we are raised to share in embodied eternal life with Jesus Christ, whose resurrection is the Pattern for our final destiny. As the Apostle John says: "Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is. And all who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure." (1John 3.2-3)

Redemptive Hell and Universal Restoration in Christ

Hieronymus Bosch, Garden of Earthly Delights. A standard picture of hell and judgement for many.

I frequently write and speak about the hope of universal restoration through the work of Jesus Christ. I often teach about how what God did in Christ is for every person who ever lived, and that Christ will not give up until Christ has reached every person who has ever lived. And yet, I also teach about the reality of Divine Judgment on our sin of denying God's Love and destroying God's children in big and small ways. I believe that hell is real, and we experience the judgment of hell in the sufferings and addictions of this life, and if we persist in selfish sin, we will experience it in the next life as well.

Brief Thoughts on Purgatory and Indulgences

Recently I saw a Protestant Christian railing against the idea that retweeting Pope Francis could "earn" time off from purgatory as a kind of "indulgence" found in this 2013 news story. The person who reposted the story asked for someone to explain what was going on with "retweeting" as an "indulgence" to lessen time in "purgatory". So I responded with this:

The Hyphen In Between

In memory of Ron Bostian (November 28, 1946 - March 14, 2017)

Today we mourn the death, but more importantly, celebrate the life, of my Dad Ron Bostian. He was 70 years old, stubborn as hell, easy to talk to, and fun loving to the end. It was from him I got my announcer's voice, my cocksure sense of self confidence, my ability to make a joke during any circumstance (no matter how inappropriate), my physical frame, and my stunning good looks. Did I mention he was sarcastic too? I inherited that as well.