Taking a Posture of a Mother and Father: Paul in 1 Thessalonians 2

Last night I had the privilege of having a hand in dedicating 3 children from our community to God, each other, and in a very real way, the onlooking world. We’d been planning on having this event for awhile now and, thankfully, our lectionary texts for the day proved to be invaluable.

The text I decided to preach on was found in 1 Thessalonians 2:1-12. Here we find Paul describing his life-on-life approach to founding a community of disciples centering their lives on, around, and in Jesus, also known as a church. He comes to them as one looking to proclaim the kingdom of God brought about by the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus. He does this, however, not through seminars, classes, street preaching, or questionnaires, but through giving his life over to them. Words alone will not suffice; he must meld his life with theirs and embody or incarnate the message he is attempting to bring to them. This is because it is not simply a hodge podge of words or some mythical story. No, he is presenting to them Jesus.

Here we find the idea of posture through Paul’s metaphor of coming to them as both a mother and father.

As a mother, Paul comes to this community opening himself up in love for the sake of them. Picture a mother nursing her child: it is an image of love and self-giving for the betterment of the child. It is a depriving of herself. It is a posture of weakness, not in a pejorative sense, but in a sense of sacrifice and, ultimately, love. It is a posture of invitation that seeks out the other with open arms.

And Paul continues to push our imaginations by claiming to also have come as a father. He came to them under the pretense that he would labor and work in order to not be a burden upon them. He was “exhorting and encouraging and imploring each one of [them] you” because he saw the need for their growth. As a disciple himself, he had to be taught what living life like and in Jesus was about. He was pushed and shaped and formed and now he was seeking to do the same. Yet again we see the love and tender care that he employs here. He wasn’t a burden, he wasn’t a hypocrite; he took on the posture of challenge and enveloped it with the posture of invitation he embodied/incarnated as a mother.

And, again, where did Paul learn all of this? He learned this from being a disciple (the Greek actually means learner) of Jesus. Jesus knew that his posture towards others would be the means by which he would influence. Like a mother, He called children to himself and used parables involving children to provoke our redemptive images of God and ourselves. Yet he pushed his followers to a fuller and more holistic way of life: a life within his new creation as his kingdom unfolds and they become the humans they were supposed to be.   If you look at the gospels, you can see that it was his embodiment of love (his posture of invitation and challenge) that powerfully formed people; his message typically pushed people away. So, we see it was his actual person/being that “attracted” people to himself, so they could understand his message. In other words, they saw how to live his message long before they could articulate his message.

And I believe this is what Paul is causing us to recall. He didn’t come up with this stuff on his own. No, he learned it and it was for the “kingdom and [God's] glory.” He brings to our attention the earthiness of our faith in that we don’t have to look very far to see how Jesus was and is: simply look to a loving mother and father. He reminds us that our lives, our practicing resurrection, must be lived in a posture that depicts what we believe. We have been called into the kingdom of God, which demands not a mere set of beliefs, but a life that interlocks and intermingles with the lives of everyone around us. In our culture, we have become good at speaking words (demonstrating what we think we know), but not incarnating words (demonstrating what we actually believe). We must be patiently postured in the midst of our family, friends, and neighbors in order to articulate our message.

Perhaps if others haven’t wondered more about our faith it is because we haven’t postured ourselves in love for God’s kingdom and glory.

Caesar’s Image versus God’s Image: An Ancient Reflection on Matthew 22

“So let us always reflect the image of God in these ways:

I do not swell up with the arrogance of pride;

nor do I droop with the blush of anger;

nor do I succumb to the passion of avarice;

nor do I surrender myself to the ravishes of gluttony;

nor do I infect myself with the duplicity of hypocrisy;

nor do I contaminate myself with the filth of rioting;

nor do I grow flippant with the pretension of conceit;

nor do I grow enamored of the burden of heavy drinking;

nor do I alienate by the dissension of mutual admiration;

nor do I infect others with the biting of detraction;

nor do I grow conceited with the vanity of gossip.

Rather, instead, I will reflect the image of God in that I feed on love;

grow certain on faith and hope;

strengthen myself on the virtue of patience;

grow tranquil by humility;

grow beautiful by chastity;

am sober by abstention;

am made happy by tranquility;

and am ready for death by practicing hospitality.

It is with such inscriptions that God imprints his coins with an impression made neither by hammer nor by chisel but has formed them with his primary divine intention. For Caesar required his image on every coin, but God has chosen man, whom he has created, to reflect his glory.”

- Homily 42 from the Incomplete Work on Matthew

Lent in 2 Minutes

This is basically a summary of what a group of us are looking and praying for through our Dinner and Discussion Lent readings. If you want to know more, let me know. We have a Facebook group, so anyone can partake. Enjoy.

The Liturgical Year: The Spiraling Adventure of the Spiritual Life by Joan Chittister

 

If you’re like me you know Christmas and Easter as the two events where the church service attendance skyrocketed. Also, if you are anything like me, you’ve heard of things like Advent and Lent, but never feasts, times of penance, or any other particular day off the Christian calendar. For many those things are “much too Catholic”, somehow equated to a work done away with by Jesus, or some other excuse for flat-out ignorance. I know for me it was.

Chittister brings out the aspects of the liturgical year in such a way that a newbie like myself can stand in awe of. The book itself is an exploration in the liturgical year, essentially from her Roman Catholic perspective, yet in a generic way that any Christian tradition could agree with. She begins with an overview of the basics and then dives into every season and major day celebrated within the calendar.

Her main contention is to bring to light the spiritual ramifications and transformation brought about by living out the Christian year in step with Jesus’ life. The Christian calendar isn’t a mundane routine meant to keep us in the know regarding the dates of Christian events. Rather, it is the following of Jesus’ birth, life, death, and resurrection as it overlaps, intertwines, deepens, and transforms our lives. The annual ins and outs of the Christian calendar bring us into the mysteries of Christ’s life that have been reflected upon and embodied for hundreds and hundreds of years by thousands and thousands of people. By allowing the life of Jesus to determine the flow of our every day, we are gently molded into and by the community Jesus brings us into.

Overall, I’d recommend the book to anyone looking to connect to the historical stream found within the Church. In a world dominated by fiscal, athletic, school, and social calendars and timetables, the liturgical calendar stands strong as a reminder that we call Jesus not only Savior, but Lord, and that includes our time and seasonal rhythms. Chittister’s book would be a great introduction for anyone seeking to enter the realm of the ancient practices.

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the publisher through the BookSneeze.com <http://BookSneeze.com> book review bloggers program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 <http://www.access.gpo.gov/nara/cfr/waisidx_03/16cfr255_03.html> : “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”

Prayer for the Week

“O God Almighty, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, grant us, we pray thee, to be grounded and settled in the truth, by the coming down of the Holy Spirit into our hearts. That which we know not…reveal; that which is wanting in us…fill up; that which we know…confirm, and keep up blameless in thy service; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.” Clement

Prayer for the week

“Light of Light, and God of God, who did bow your holy heavens and descend to earth for the salvation of the world, out of your love of humanity; extend your almighty right hand, and send out your blessings on us all…Guide our steps into the paths of righteousness, that we may behave ourselves according to your will and observe your commandments and do them all the days of our life, and come to a blessed end and sing a ceaseless hymn with your saints to you, and your Father and your Holy Spirit. Amen.” – Liturgy of Dioscorus

Prayer for the week

“Lord Jesus, think on me,

Nor let me go astray

Through darkness and perplexity

You point the heavenly way.

Lord Jesus, think on me,

That when the flood is past, I may the eternal brightness see,

And share your joy at last.” – Synesius of Cyrene

“But not if I do not say them.”

I’ve been reading In Constant Prayer by Robert Benson as of late. It is a great little book, which by the way, you can get for $2.99 at Ollies, focusing on the daily office. If you don’t know what that is, it is basically a set prayer or set of set prayers that one prays everyday, typically at the same times everyday. Rather than use random words, the office points us to God by using biblical phrasing concentrating on God and his priorities over our own. It is an ancient practice that has been followed by many, many Christians of all stripes. Unfortunately, it has been dropped by many American evangelical denominations and individuals, adding to the lack of historicity in the American evangelical church. It connects us to the people of the past by praying together with those we have in the present for the future of those after us.

The book is great and I sincerely recommend it. I could give you many, many quotes, but I’ll give you this one I just read.

“The office is just a collection of words. But words are powerful things. Who knows what a single one of them might do to us over time?

In the beginning was the Word- and here is everything else now, including me and you and all that there is, seen and unseen, all of it alive with the life of that single word. From which has flowed grace upon grace.

Words are powerful things.

The daily office offers me rich, powerful, and profound words that can change me and shape me. Words that have been given as a gift through the ages to me and to you. Words that can grow in me and give voice to the groaning of my heart when I cannot. Words that can teach me to be attentive to and to perceive the meaning of the work of God. Words that will lead me into a deeper and deeper communion with God.

But not if I do not say them.“

I bought this book because I want to learn more about prayer. I want to because I’m learning that I need to pray. I think for too long I thought prayers had to be sporadic, personal, and off-the-cuff if they were to be “authentic”. Now I’m beginning to rethink that.

The reason I like this small section is because it tells me the truth that I have to say the words. I can’t think about praying them. I can’t talk about praying them. I have to pray them.

Prayer for the week

“That it may please you to bring us to everlasting joys; that it may please you to hear us. Son of God.

O Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world; Spare us.

O Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world; Give us pardon.

O Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world; Hear us.” – from the Gallican Litanies

The Ideal Eyewitness

Quite some time ago I “borrowed” from my dad Richard Bauckham’s book Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospel as Eyewitness Testimony. I think I asked for it as a resource for my thesis, which ironically, was the very reason I didn’t get to read it. As the title makes obvious, the book is written in order to detail the eyewitness authority of the Gospels. If you don’t know already there is quite the contingency that says the Gospels were written much later by the community of Jesus-followers. As such, they didn’t really write down what happened; rather they wrote down what they wanted to have happened or what they thought should have happened. Arguments along those lines have been rampant, yet flawed, and now Bauckham’s work staunchly challenges that.

One quote that stuck out was concerning the role and identity of these eyewitnesses:

“…for Greek and Roman historians, the ideal eyewitness was not the dispassionate observer but one who, as a participant, had been closest to the events and whose direct experience enabled him to understand and interpret the significance of what he had seen.”

The historians of the Romans and Greeks didn’t look for those whom were sitting on the outside of the events they were chronicling. Some of the ancient historians were themselves participants of the events they were writing about. By taking action within the event itself, their eyewitnesses could attest to what actually did happen, thus making them the originators of the stories. Not only did this make them the responsible ones for getting the story out, it also made them the continuation of the story. Bauckham argues this is what is happening when we read the Gospels. We are reading the events and those listed in the stories because of their involvement as the story-tellers. As the story-tellers they could be looked up and asked what happened as the events that occurred were public events which could be evaluated and fact-checked if needed be. Hence, Luke tells us this is exactly what he did. He checked out the living actors in the story of Jesus for his gospel for the actual story. Just like their Greek and Roman contemporaries, the historians of the Gospels looked for, and in some instances were, eyewitnesses of the events and stories of Jesus.

The thing that struck me was the participatory nature of the “ideal eyewitnesses”. Objectivity wasn’t overruled by the subjective nature of the eyewitnesses, if there is such a thing as objectivity, but that’s another story. Imagine the story of someone who was in a car accident versus the story of someone who watched it from the nearby house. Or the person on the Manhattan street on September 11th versus those of who watched it on television. Whom do you think would have had a better story? Whom do you think would have a memory lasting for his/her lifetime? Whom do you think would be the authority on what actually happened?

Now for my point: Perhaps the Church isn’t being as impacting because we aren’t being participants. How can we be eyewitnesses to what God is doing if we aren’t participating in it? For too long we have made Church about going to a building and getting our needs met. Think about our services. Are they participatory and formative in a way that sends us out to be a blessing to the world? Think about our programs. Are they inward focused, becoming “huddle-and-cuddle” times? Think about our lives. Have we become “dispassionate observers” or are we jumping into the mix and participating in what God has set in motion? Do we even know the story we are a part of?

We have to be participating in the story in order to know, tell, and do the story.