These are a couple by Rend Collective that I’ve been singing lately; they have something to say that I need to hear, and I’m sure I’m not the only one.
Sing it from the Shackles
Category Archives: Video
The Sermon on the Mount as gospel
Additional comments on structure:
Paying attention to the structure of the Sermon on the Mount can be difficult, because it isn’t linear in its argument, and doesn’t flow the way essays and speeches in Western culture do. As a result, there’s little agreement among scholars on its structure—or even if it has one. Some, like W. D. Davies, go so far as to conclude that it has none at all, but is merely “an agglomeration of sources and even of snippets of tradition.” This allows us to read it as a disjointed jumble of topics with little real coherence or unity.
I believe the Sermon has a strong structure which makes sense if we understand and remember the common literary structures of the Old Testament, and particularly its use of parallelism. Parallelism of various types is common in the literature of the ancient world, both for aesthetic effect and as an aid to memory—which was of great importance in those largely pre-literate cultures. The Old Testament is no exception. Most simply, we see parallelism in individual verses, such as the step parallelism (AB A’B’ pattern) of Isaiah 28:17:
I will make justice the measuring line,
and righteousness the plumb line.
In verses like Isaiah 41:9, we see an AB B’A’ pattern, called inverted parallelism or chiasm:
I took you from the ends of the earth,
and from its farthest corners I called you.
(The word “chiasm” comes from the Greek letter X (pronounced khi); if one draws lines between the parallel elements in these lines, they form an X.)
These basic forms can be extended beyond just two lines into more complex parallels.
This is especially true of inverted parallelism, which scholars like Kenneth Bailey argue is used to structure paragraphs, whole passages, and perhaps even entire biblical books. These larger forms are also commonly referred to as chiasms or chiastic structures; since the original visual metaphor is lost on this scale, however, I prefer the term “ring composition” for these texts. In such literary units, the parallelism serves a purpose beyond the aesthetic or the mnemonic: it also functions in part to shape and reinforce the message and meaning of the text. The climax of the piece typically comes not at the end but in the center section around which it turns. The opening and closing sections are next in importance because they set the theme of the composition and provide the context for its argument.
I believe the Sermon on the Mount is a ring composition, and that understanding this opens up the meaning of the text and helps us make sense of its more obscure parts. Viewed in this way, for instance, it isn’t necessary to say, “The connection of Matt. 7:1–11 (cf. Luke 6:37–38, 41–42) to the preceding context is not easy to discern,” or to conclude that Matthew 7:6 is a “detached unrelated saying,” as David L. Turner does, because the structure shows us the connections.
The Sermon on the Mount as Ring Composition
A 5:1-10 The way of the disciple: already blessed
B 5:11-16 The way of the disciple: marks of a true disciple
C 5:17-20 Thesis: Jesus fulfills the Law and the Prophets
D 5:21-37 The true application of the law (correcting misuse)
E 5:38-48 Trust in God (contrast with Gentiles)
F 6:1-6 Reward: earth vs. heaven
G 6:7-8 On prayer: trust
H 6:9-13 Lord’s Prayer
G` 6:14-15 On prayer: forgiveness
F` 6:16-24 Reward: earth vs. heaven
E` 6:25-34 Trust in God (contrast with Gentiles)
D` 7:1-6 The true application of the law (correcting misuse)
G“ 7:7-11 On prayer: trust
C` 7:12 Thesis: Jesus summarizes the Law and the Prophets
B` 7:13-23 Two ways: marks of a false disciple
A` 7:24-29 Two ways: already blessed/already cursed
E: God’s character: justice, longsuffering, ḥesed, including his provision for the world
E:` God’s character: his care for us, illustrated by his provision for the world
Lent in the Time of COVID-19
I’ve been spending a lot of time the last few weeks thinking about the fact that this pandemic season of physical distancing and isolation is a Lenten season, and trying to figure out what to do with that. I wasn’t getting a lot of traction until I read an article this week in Christianity Today‘s annual issue for pastors on Evagrius Ponticus and the sin of acedia—which is usually translated “sloth” in English, but means much more than that. I gave myself a while today to think out loud about it.
Waiting Is Not Easy!
Ah, the wit and whimsy of Mo Willems . . .
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The God of Sight and Blindness
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After healing the man born blind, Jesus said, “I have come into this world for judgment, so that the blind will see and those who see will become blind.” In saying that, he was playing a variation on a theme which appears in a number of places in Scripture—the section often called “Second Isaiah,” chapters 40-55, is one prominent example—but nowhere more importantly than in two psalms, 115 and 135. These are, I believe, the key for us in understanding the language of blindness and sight in the word of God. Listen—this is Psalm 115:2-11.
Why do the nations say,
“Where is their God?”
Our God is in the heavens;
he does whatever he pleases.
Their idols are silver and gold,
the work of human hands.
They have mouths, but cannot speak;
eyes, but cannot see.
They have ears, but cannot hear;
noses, but cannot smell.
They have hands, but cannot feel;
feet, but cannot walk;
nor can they make a sound with their throats.
Those who make them become like them,
and so do all who trust in them.
O house of Israel, trust in the Lord!
He is their help and their shield.
O house of Aaron, trust in the Lord!
He is their help and their shield.
You who fear the Lord, trust in the Lord!
He is their help and their shield.
Do you see? We become like what we worship. Idolatry produces spiritual blindness. This is what Jesus is on about: simply by being who and what he was, he revealed the truth of people’s hearts as they either drew near to him or clung hard to their idols. We don’t think of the Pharisees as idolaters, but they were; their religion—and their place in it—was their idol, and they unhesitatingly chose it over God, and so they were blinded to what was happening right in front of them.
That same reality underlies the story of Elisha and the Syrian army and God’s most remarkable act of deliverance. Please open your Bibles to 2 Kings 6, and let’s walk through that passage this morning; we’ll be looking at verses 8-23. Read more
The Promise of Deliverance
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(Genesis 11:27-12:7, 15:1-18, 17:1-16; Romans 4:2-5, 16b-25; Hebrews 11:8-9a)
That’s the scale and scope of God’s plan. That’s the size of his purpose: the redemption of nothing less than everything. As we saw last week, God has been a God of deliverance from the moment our first parents sinned. There’s a popular idea that “the God of the Old Testament” is all about fire and brimstone and judgment and wrath, while Jesus and the New Testament give us a God who’s all about love and mercy and forgiveness—don’t believe it, it’s bunk. Pure tripe. Right from the first, God has been on about redemption and deliverance for those who are enslaved by sin and oppressed by death. Yes, his wrath is a real thing: it’s the wrath of the lover against anyone and anything that hurts the beloved. His wrath is against sin and death. If we cling to our sin kicking and screaming, then his wrath falls on us as well as a consequence; but if we let him work, it becomes the surgeon’s scalpel to cut us free from the power of sin and death. God is in the deliverance business—all in, full stop.
Follow Me!
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Note: the video is longer than the audio as it includes a bit more than just the sermon proper.
This is the hinge of the gospel of Luke. To this point, Jesus has had a spectacular ministry career. He has established himself as a teacher who speaks with authority, he’s done spectacular miracles—everything is rolling along beautifully. And then, instead of capitalizing on his success as any smart preacher would, Jesus tossed it all aside and—as Rich Mullins put it—“set his face like a flint toward Jerusalem.” Everything that happens in Luke from now into chapter 19, in what’s commonly called the Travel Narrative, happens on the way to the cross.
Fairy tales and trigger warnings
Fairy tales, then, are not responsible for producing in children fear, or any of the shapes of fear; fairy tales do not give the child the idea of the evil or the ugly; that is in the child already, because it is in the world already. Fairy tales do not give the child his first idea of bogey. What fairy tales give the child is his first clear idea of the possible defeat of bogey. The baby has known the dragon intimately ever since he had an imagination. What the fairy tale provides for him is a St. George to kill the dragon. Exactly what the fairy tale does is this: it accustoms him for a series of clear pictures to the idea that these limitless terrors had a limit, that these shapeless enemies have enemies in the knights of God, that there is something in the universe more mystical than darkness, and stronger than strong fear.
—G. K. Chesterton, Tremendous Trifles (1909), XVII: “The Red Angel”
I thought of this quote as I read N. D. Wilson’s recent essay “Why I Write Scary Stories for Children.” Wilson has much the same message, except that in his case, it comes as a product of his own experience as a parent.
I write violent stories. I write dark stories. I write them for my own children, and I write them for yours. And when the topic comes up with a radio host or a mom or a teacher in a hallway, the explanation is simple. Every kid in every classroom, every kid in a bunk bed frantically reading by flashlight, every latchkey kid and every helicoptered kid, every single mortal child is growing into a life story in a world full of dangers and beauties. Every one will have struggles and ultimately, every one will face death and loss.
There is absolutely a time and a place for The Pokey Little Puppy and Barnyard Dance, just like there’s a time and a place for footie pajamas. But as children grow, fear and danger and terror grow with them, courtesy of the world in which we live and the very real existence of shadows. The stories on which their imaginations feed should empower a courage and bravery stronger than whatever they are facing. And if what they are facing is truly and horribly awful (as is the case for too many kids), then fearless sacrificial friends walking their own fantastical (or realistic) dark roads to victory can be a very real inspiration and help. . . .
Overwhelmingly, in my own family and far beyond, the stories that land with the greatest impact are those where darkness, loss, and danger (emotional or physical) is a reality. But the goal isn’t to steer kids into stories of darkness and violence because those are the stories that grip readers. The goal is to put the darkness in its place.
Wilson tells the story of his oldest child, who at the age of 7 was given screaming nightmares by an illustration in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe of the vile creatures that served the White Witch. Rather than trying to protect his son from his own imagination, he decided (with some trepidation) “to try [to] embolden his subconscious mind.”
I carried my son into my office and downloaded an old version of Quake—a first-person shooter video game with nasty, snarling aliens 10 times worse than anything drawn by Pauline. I put my son on my lap with his finger on the button that fired our pixelated shotgun, and we raced through the first level, blasting every monster and villain away. Then we high-fived, I pitched him a quick story about himself as a monster hunter, and then I prayed with him and tucked him back into bed. A bit bashfully, I admitted to my wife what I had just done—hoping I wouldn’t regret it.
I didn’t. The nightmare never shook him again.
We do no one any favors when we try to protect them from the darkness of this world.Read more
Antonin Scalia, RIP
I’m late noting this, I realize, but I’m just getting over a nasty bug that laid me out for more than a week. Even late, though, I couldn’t just let this go, because I believe Antonin Scalia’s death is a great loss to the Republic. Justice Scalia was indeed “one of the most brilliant and combative justices ever to sit on the Court, and one of the most prominent legal thinkers of his generation,” as Lesley Stahl described him in the introduction to his 60 Minutes profile.
He was also, by the testimony of his fellow justices, a good colleague and a good friend. Though a passionate conservative in matters of law and society, his closest friend on the Court was its leading liberal mind, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, with whom he had a close relationship going back to their days on the D.C. Circuit Court. (Hence Justice Ginsburg in the thumbnail for the first video above.) That didn’t mean that he pulled his punches; he always treated her with respect, which meant in part that he knew she was tough enough and smart enough to argue hard. Ginsburg once commented, “I love him, but sometimes I’d like to strangle him.” On the whole, though, she appreciated it:
We disagreed now and then [!?], but when I wrote for the Court and received a Scalia dissent, the opinion ultimately released was notably better than my initial circulation.
Justice Scalia nailed all the weak spots — the “applesauce” and “argle bargle”—and gave me just what I needed to strengthen the majority opinion. He was a jurist of captivating brilliance and wit, with a rare talent to make even the most sober judge laugh.
Song of the Week
This is one of my favorites from Van Morrison. The video below, though, is of Phil Keaggy performing this song at Creation in 1992; yes, it’s a cover rather than the original, but I love Keaggy’s guitar work on this one.
When Will I Ever Learn to Live in God?
The sun was setting over Avalon
The last time we stood in the west.
Suffering long time angels enraptured by Blake
Burn out the dross, innocence captured again.
Standing on the beach at sunset,
All the boats keep moving slow
In the glory of the flashing light,
In the evening’s glow.
Chorus
When will I ever learn to live in God?
When will I ever learn?
He gives me everything I need and more
When will I ever learn?
You brought it to my attention that everything was made in God.
Down through centuries of great writings and paintings,
Everything lives in God,
Seen through architecture of great cathedrals
Down through the history of time,
Is and was in the beginning and evermore shall be.
Chorus
Whatever it takes to fulfill his mission,
That is the way we must go;
But you’ve got to do it in your own way:
Tear down the old, bring up the new.
And up on the hillside it’s quiet,
Where the shepherd is tending his sheep.
And over the mountains and the valleys,
The countryside is so green.
Standing on the highest hill with a sense of wonder,
You can see everything is made in God.
Head back down the roadside and give thanks for it all.
Chorus out
Words and music: Van Morrison
© 1989 Barrule UK Ltd.
From the album Avalon Sunset
Photo: “Lofoten Sunset,” © 2013 Sø Jord. License: Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic.