Holy Scriptures! I have worked with Mike at a couple of Group Workcamps over the last 5 or 6 years. He’s working on an M.Div in Youth Ministry in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and he recently shared this thought-provoking post that touches on everything we do as the church and as followers of Jesus if we really believe that God’s kingdom has arrived. It’s worth your five minutes, for sure!
I’ve been reading an evangelical ecclesiology (how you understand “church”) book, and ran across a small section about women in the community of the church.
In the seminary I attend, although we accept women openly in pastoral studies, I think the way they are treated in the classrooms and community is an uphill battle most of time.
To be frank, I am supportive of women as pastors. I will have to tell that story sometime in another post.
However, in this book, Exploring Ecclesiology, Harper and Metzger present a great argument for women in pastoral ministry (don’t know if they intend to or not, but it’s good nonetheless). It’s an argument that I’ve never considered before, and it’s beautiful.
For Old Testament, we students reflect weekly on “some topic, aspect or concept” from the volumes and volumes of assigned reading. I am limited to one single-spaced page each week, and in every case I’ve been forced to cut myself off from writing. So read knowing that my thoughts are manifold!
If you are interested in more selections from my School of Theology Coursework, follow the link to the category of SOT Coursework. I have also set up a new category for these Old Testament reflection papers called OT Weeklies. If all goes well, each new reflection paper will be posted automatically at 2:00 p.m. each Monday, when my Old Testament class convenes.
What follows is my reflection paper from the week of February 21. Enjoy!
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In reading the New Testament, one indirectly reads a lot of Isaiah. Though detached some 800 years from the life of the historical Isaiah, the four evangelists make numerous Isaianic connections to the life, death and message of Jesus. In doing so, these early Christian writers are merely continuing a tradition that manifests itself in the latter half of our canonical book of Isaiah, when the prophet’s original message was found to have new meanings for a nation threatened by Babylon and a people returned from exile.[1] For better or for worse, Matthew’s birth narrative identifies Jesus with a young woman whose child will be named “God with us,” or Emmanuel. Furthermore, the Christian claims to Isaiah 53 require no superfluous introduction. It is no wonder that this Isaianic legacy of Ἰησοῦν τὸν λεγόμενον Χριστόν leads Gordon McConville to devote a large sidebar to the question of whether prophecy is predictive.[2]
Meanwhile, I am developing this reflection paper under the guise that Isaiah’s prophecies are better understood as prescriptive. In other words, was Jesus’ awareness of the full body of Isaiah something of a roadmap for his ministry? Even if one doubts the scene in the Nazarene synagogue wherein Jesus was said to read from the scroll of Isaiah (Lk 4:16-20), as many scholars do, one cannot deny that his ministry drew special inspiration from Isaiah. For example, Jesus’ unique devotion to the cause of the poor evokes Isaiah’s description of the “shoot” of Jesse: “He shall not judge by what his eyes see . . . but with righteousness he shall judge the poor, and decide with equity for the meek of the earth” (Is 11:3-4 NRSV).
Moreover, Jesus’ Isaianic orientation may have even borrowed and adapted thematic elements for his signature parable form. Isaiah sings of a vineyard that produces wild grapes (Is 5:1-7), while Jesus tells of a vineyard that received new laborers as the day progressed (Mt 20:1-16). Whereas Isaiah’s vineyard represented the house of Israel, Jesus develops a portrait of the vineyard as an instrument for the kingdom of heaven, which is buttressed by a second Matthean vineyard parable, that of the wicked tenants (Mt 28:33-41). A simple matter of collecting the harvest gives way to murder, and the vineyard is unproductive in a manner that Steve Moyise suggests would, without pause, “suggest to a Jewish audience the allegory of Is 5.”[3] Another parable true to the theme of Isaiah’s vineyard is that of the barren fig tree (Lk 13:6-9). In both cases, the owner of the plant expects it to follow the natural order and yield proper fruit, and furthermore, a condemnation against Israel is implied, given that “the fig tree is a common sign of divine blessings in Jewish lore.”[4] As Moyise explains, “the reason Jesus introduces the fig tree is because it concentrates the divine judgment in one single act. Is 5 describes the destruction of the vineyard in a series of actions . . . but cutting down a fig tree is swift and decisive.”[5]
We can scarcely doubt that the book of Isaiah inspired its first generation of hearers and even continues to do so today; consider that Isaiah 11 is read aloud in modern Israeli synagogues both during Passover and on Yom Ha’atsmaut, the country’s Independence Day.[6] It is no stretch of the imagination, therefore, that Jesus’ own ministry, and indeed, his self-understanding, were prescribed and informed by themes of a peaceful kingdom, the coming judgment, the suffering servant, the gathering of nations, and a “Wonderful Counselor” (Is 9:6 NRSV), all of which are developed in Isaiah.
[1] J. Gordon McConville, A Guide to the Prophets, vol. 4 of Exploring the Old Testament (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2002), 4.
Friends, this idea could spread like a wild fire, or it could fall flat on its face. The basic premise? I want to raise support, just $2 at a time, so I can travel to Israel this summer for an archaeological excavation. Take a look and share the link for me, won’t you?
Anderson University, through the Gustav Jeeninga Museum for Bible and Near Eastern Studies, offers one student the opportunity to experience a dig program in the Middle East each summer. I applied to be that one student this year, but today (February 18) I learned that I was not chosen to do so. Unremarkably, that didn't make me want to dig this year any less. The ancient site of Tel Hazor, Israel. So I decided to take matters into my own hands a … Read More
For Old Testament, we students reflect weekly on “some topic, aspect or concept” from the volumes and volumes of assigned reading. I am limited to one single-spaced page each week, and in every case I’ve been forced to cut myself off from writing. So read knowing that my thoughts are manifold!
If you are interested in more selections from my School of Theology Coursework, follow the link to the category of SOT Coursework. I have also set up a new category for these Old Testament reflection papers called OT Weeklies. If all goes well, each new reflection paper will be posted automatically at 2:00 p.m. each Monday, when my Old Testament class convenes.
What follows is my reflection paper from the week of February 14. Enjoy!
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Amos begins his prophetic book with what I suggest might be referred to as the “reverse gospel.” Whereas the actual gospel is good news first revealed through the seed of Abraham and later, most poignantly and emphatically, to all nations, Amos’ condemnations from the mouth of Yahweh are just the opposite. Bad, or harsh, news filters first to Israel’s neighbors, but most critically upon Israel itself. And despite the difficulty in reasonably or confidently dating all of the oracles against the nations to Amos himself and the time in which he preached, the lesson from these sharp and biting words is not principally that Yahweh will judge them (though that is certainly important), but that Yahweh will judge Israel all the more. Yes, other nations have rebelled, but is that not to be expected given their lack of immediate inclusion within the unfolding revelation of Yahweh? Yet Israel, which had been given the promises of Yahweh, wasted them given that they “sell the righteous for silver . . . trample the head of the poor into the dust of the earth,” and “lay themselves down beside every altar” (Am 2:6-8 NRSV). Judah, for its part, has also “rejected the law of [Yahweh], and have not kept his statutes” (Am 2:4 NRSV). So while the other nations have committed innumerable acts against Israel and Judah, Israel and Judah have committed graver sins against Yahweh.
This is reflective of Jesus’ words in the parable of the faithful servant: “From everyone to whom much has been given, much will be required; and from the one to whom much has been entrusted, even more will be demanded” (Lk 12:48 NRSV). Israel and Judah have been given much—indeed, they have been given Yahweh himself! Through their actions, however, they have chosen to squander, or at least disregard, the promise that through them the nations of the world would be blessed (Gn 12:3), and have practiced their desire to become like the other nations (1 Sm 8:20). As Victor H. Matthews cogently explains, Amos develops a message through a rhetorical strategy of judgment upon other nations as a gradual, yet grandiose, crescendo to his ultimate message of condemnation against Israel.[1]
Amos’ repeated admonitions to “seek [Yahweh] and live” (Am 5:6 NRSV) are closely connected to the Day of Yahweh. While it may be more germane to the text to imagine an inverse as seek not-Yahweh and die, I believe the modern body of believers can take even more meaning if the passage from Amos is interpreted as seek Yahweh and liveas Yahweh intended you to live. In rejecting basic commands to resolutely pursue justice for all people and worship Yahweh with authenticity, Israel may be physically alive, but is spiritually and communally dead. Yahweh yearns for his people to return to right relationships, both with one’s neighbors and one’s God, and therefore also be alive in community and in worship. The book of Hosea conveys a similar theme in comparing Israel’s conduct to prostitution, as when Yahweh commands Hosea to “take for yourself a wife of whoredom and have children of whoredom, for the land commits great whoredom by forsaking [Yahweh]” (Hos 1:2 NRSV).
Amos may also teach us that the prophetic word can lose its sting when indictment and condemnation are so quickly followed by a fluffy pillow of reassurance and blessing. Though this pattern displays a beautiful theological message in the context of Isaiah, Jeremiah and others, Amos tugs more strongly at the notion of a collective, required repentance. Matthews writes, “Amos does not waste words on deaf ears. He simply tells them all what they need to know to live and leaves it to them to act on this advice.”[2] Such a message is in contrast to the guarantee that Yahweh will relent in Hosea: “I will not execute my fierce anger . . . for I am God and no mortal” (Hos 11:9 NRSV). Though sharp and biting words alone may seize our attention, thank-fully, the ways of man are not the way of Yahweh and our gospel is not presented in reverse.
[1] Victor H. Matthews, Social World of the Hebrew Prophets (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, Inc., 2001), 68-69.
For Old Testament, we students reflect weekly on “some topic, aspect or concept” from the volumes and volumes of assigned reading. I am limited to one single-spaced page each week, and in every case I’ve been forced to cut myself off from writing. So read knowing that my thoughts are manifold!
If you are interested in more selections from my School of Theology Coursework, follow the link to the category of SOT Coursework. I have also set up a new category for these Old Testament reflection papers called OT Weeklies. If all goes well, each new reflection paper will be posted automatically at 2:00 p.m. each Monday, when my Old Testament class convenes.
What follows is my reflection paper from the week of February 7. Enjoy!
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This reflection paper will explore the prophet Joel’s use of a particular Hebrew proper name in his prophecy regarding the Day of Yahweh. Near the end of the first chapter, the book reads, “Alas for the day! For the day of (Yahweh) is near, and as destruction from the Almighty it comes” (Jl 1:15 NRSV). This verse, which takes from its close parallel in Isaiah 13:6, features a footnote in my Bible that the word “Almighty” is the current adaptation of the Hebrew word “Shaddai”; in fact, most English translations choose to interpret the confusing Hebrew term as a descriptive feature for Yahweh rather than its variety of other possible constructions. Though this is understandable for our modern monotheistic setting, Shaddai is rendered in the NRSV translation of both Joel and Isaiah as a simile, which sparked a question: am I reading a metaphor for some well-known person or deity who would have been plainly obvious to the biblical writers, or is the author simply conveying the destructive characteristic of Yahweh?
After further research, I found that the terms “Shaddai” or “El Shaddai” appear 48 times in the Hebrew Bible. Six of these occurrences are in Genesis, three are in the remainder of the Pentateuch, and a remarkable 31 mentions come from Job alone.[1] In seeking to understand the origin of the term, however, scholarly attention has focused on the mentions from Genesis, where Shaddai is strongly connected to promises of fertility, and especially, distinguishing characteristics of the female anatomy. While etymologically a handful of meanings have been suggested, David Biale agrees that “the original meaning of shadu was probably ‘breast’ which, by a psychological association evident to the author of the Enûma Elish in ancient times and to Freud in our own, came to mean mountain.”[2] Nowhere is this double entendre more evident than in Genesis 49, when an aging Jacob invokes the blessing of Shaddai on Joseph that will manifest as “blessings of the breasts and of the womb” (Gn 49:25 NRSV). Jacob continues to remark that his blessing upon Joseph is “stronger than the blessings of the eternal mountains” (Gn 49:26 NRSV). Furthermore, of the remaining mentions of Shaddai in Genesis, “four are fertility blessings of the ‘be fruitful and multiply’ variety,”[3] as evidenced by the promise to Abraham (Gn 17:1-7) and Isaac’s instruction for Jacob to take a wife from the house of Bethuel (Gn 28:1-5).
With the connection of Shaddai and fertility firmly established, the quest to understand the prophetic meaning of the term can begin. Surely Isaiah and Joel were not implying that the Day of Yahweh would be like one filled with breasts and fertility. This has led Biale to conclude that Shaddai language fell out of popularity among writers of the Old Testament books, perhaps around the seventh century b.c.e. when King Josiah’s reforms drove out Caananite fertility practices, including Asherah worship. In ridding the land of cultic behavior, however, Israelites had to deal with their own patriarchal fixation on Shaddai. Biale writes, “The psychological associations between El Shaddai and Asherah must have become embarrassing and even dangerous. Yet the old name could not be utterly suppressed.”[4] The solution was to retain the name Shaddai, but ascribe warrior-like qualities to the pseudo-deity, as in the Psalms: “When the Almighty scattered kings there, snow fell on Zalmon” (Ps 68:14 NRSV). Effectively, Shaddai’s fertility powers and breasts had been covered up, but Shaddai became powerful in conquest.
So while Joel piggybacks on the ideas of Isaiah, a calculated move that serves to further legitimize both within the canon, neither seems aware of Shaddai’s previous fertility qualities. Instead, both prophets are in agreement: the Day of Yahweh will bring destruction similar to that of an almighty warrior-deity, an alter ego of Yahweh. The motherly characteristics of Yahweh, by which he was known to the patriarchs (Ex 6:3), are sadly lost to history.
[1] David Biale, “The God with Breasts: El Shaddai in the Bible,” History of Religions 21, no. 3 (Feb. 1982), 243.
For Old Testament, we students reflect weekly on “some topic, aspect or concept” from the volumes and volumes of assigned reading. I am limited to one single-spaced page each week, and in every case I’ve been forced to cut myself off from writing. So read knowing that my thoughts are manifold!
If you are interested in more selections from my School of Theology Coursework, follow the link to the category of SOT Coursework. I have also set up a new category for these Old Testament reflection papers called OT Weeklies. If all goes well, each new reflection paper will be posted automatically at 2:00 p.m. each Monday, when my Old Testament class convenes.
What follows is my reflection paper from the week of January 31. Enjoy!
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For the modern critical scholar, both the book and the person of Jonah are difficult to date, relate, and investigate for a variety of reasons. The contents of the book of Jonah do not exactly lend historical credence to its narrative elements, perhaps leading to a suggestion that the text was intended solely as moral literature. A clue useful in pinning down the prophet is offered outside of the book bearing his name, as Old Testament readers also find Jonah delivering a message of expansion from Yahweh to King Jeroboam, son of Joash. Speaking of King Jeroboam II, the 2 Kings texts reads, “He restored the border of Israel from Lebohamath as far as the sea of the Arabah, according to the word of [Yahweh], the God of Israel, which he spoke by his servant Jonah son of Amittai, the prophet, who was from Gath-hepher” (2 Kgs 14:25 NRSV). So how does an easily forgettable character, known only for prophesying to an unfavorable king of Israel, end up famous for a strange amphibious encounter to possibly being mentioned within Jesus’ ministry for his σημεῖον, or sign (Mt 16:4)? In his examination of the Jonah narrative’s insight into Old Testament Israel’s conception of mission, Daniel C. Timmer wonders aloud if the surviving literature is “as much a rogue as its main character, playing havoc with the theological expectations of the canonical reader.”[1] As this reflection paper explores, very little of the “rogue” Jonah narrative follows a “normal” or “expected” path.
Here’s a rendering of what probably didn’t ever happen.
Careful readers are immediately confronted with the amount of liberties taken within the text, from the points at which it simply lacks specificity to instances of abject hyperbole. For example, J. Gordon McConville writes that Jonah’s depiction of Nineveh’s size hardly matches current archaeological observations, and, moreover, that the literature is unlikely to reflect the actual system of government within the city.[2] So while the original author of Jonah would have undoubtedly known about Nineveh, a sense of distance from the city—both in proximity and theology—accompanies the text. Meanwhile, a number of other details range from improbable to outrageous, including Jonah’s manic depressive behavior, the suggestion of knee-jerk city-wide repentance, to even pondering the anatomical features and requirements of a fish great enough to swallow a man. Finally, one has to wonder at the gullibility of the Ninevites. In his supposed travels through the town’s streets, Jonah was hardly specific about the prophecy he received or even the one from whom it had been received, and yet the inhabitants of Nineveh either follow the king’s lead in mourning and fasting or beat him entirely to the punch. The king’s speech suggests that Jonah may have even obscured the name of Yahweh as he prophesied, as the generic ‘elohim is used: “Who knows? God may relent and change his mind” (Jon 3:9 NRSV).
Perhaps the most significant unexpected element of the narrative is the repentance of Nineveh, which was acceptable to Yahweh and qualified Jonah as “the most successful evangelist in history,” per Victor H. Matthews.[3] Given that the historicity of the Jonah story is deeply in question, the temporal salvation of Nineveh would have been a lesson to the author’s first audience, and it may have been as shocking as the Beatitudes or the parable of the Good Samaritan were to those gathered around Jesus. As Matthews and McConville document, Jonah reads as a coming out party for universalism, or the availability of Yahweh to people groups beyond Israel, though it should stand equally as a caution against both evading the call of God and expecting certain outcomes from one’s ministry. Despite the problems that pervade Jonah, the inherent theological lessons are not diminished by the possibility of pure literary origin.
[1] Daniel C. Timmer, “Jonah and Mission: Missiological Dichotomy, Biblical Theology, and the Via Tertia,” Westminster Theological Journal 70, no. 1 (Spring 2008), 160.
[2] J. Gordon McConville, A Guide to the Prophets, vol. 4 of Exploring the Old Testament (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2002), 186.
[3] Victor H. Matthews, Social World of the Hebrew Prophets (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, Inc., 2001), 165.
My class for Church of God History frequently requires assignments similar to those you may have seen me post for Old Testament class. While I will not be posting every one of these assignments, I will select those that I regard as interesting, worthwhile or enjoyable for posting on the blog. In particular, the prompt for this assignment included an evaluation of D.S. Warner‘s claim, as made in 1878, that the holiness doctrine could not prosper on sectarian soil. Read on and learn!
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Rather famously, Daniel S. Warner wrote in a March 1878 diary entry essentially that holiness was not possible in a denominationally rich environment. But as our duty is to understand history in its proper context, it is foolish to simply repeat this groundbreaking thought without applying the historical perspective. After being strongly influenced by his second wife, Sarah, and her father, Warner came to appreciate entire sanctification as the second work of grace to the extent that he sought the experience himself, ultimately declaring in July 1877 that the process had been completed.[1] Naturally, Warner then began to teach entire sanctification and the doctrine of holiness to his audiences, much to the chagrin of boards of elders. While initially Warner was only reprimanded for his tendencies, he eventually overstepped boundaries by bringing in holiness “bands” and had his license to preach revoked on January 30, 1878. As Warner later would recall, the day after being excused from preaching was one of divine revelation. He wrote,
“On the 31st of last January the Lord showed me that holiness could never prosper on sectarian soil encumbered by human creeds and party names, and gave me a new commission to join holiness and all truth together and build up the apostolic church of the living God. Praise his name! I will obey him.”[2]
D.S. Warner
In examining the declarative statement comprising first half of this quote, we realize that two main issues are brought to the forefront. It becomes possible, then, to evaluate the issues on the basis of their inherent limitations and strengths. First, Warner’s devotion to the advancement of holiness is observed. Though he has only grasped or accepted the doctrine for a short period of time, holiness and sanctification are of the utmost concern to him, which is further supported by the way in which he jeopardized his previous position as preacher. Second, it is hard to avoid Warner’s opposition to sectarianism. Throughout the decade of the 1870s, numerous quotes suggest that he was fed up with denominational thinking, which is crystallized in an April 1876 diary entry saying, “O Sectarianism! thou abomination of the earth, thou bane of the cause of God, when will thy corrupt and wicked walls fall to earth and cease to curse men to hell?”[3]
Consideration of these aforementioned two issues and their limitations must address the timeline of Warner’s thought development and the proximity of the ultimate revelation in regard to his dismissal from preaching. In doing so, it is unavoidable that Warner realized the “abomination” of denominational chest-thumping much earlier than he latched onto holiness doctrine. Therefore, was Warner’s January 31, 1878-dated claim a true revelation from the Lord, as he professed, or simply the adaptation of long-held feelings on sectarianism to a newly revealed problem, that is, the revocation of his license to preach freely? Furthermore, it needs to be admitted that bitterness may have played a role in making the claim; as he wrote on January 31, his dismissal was a “dreadful calamity and intolerable to bear.”[4] Another significant limitation of Warner’s claim is evident through the application of the measuring stick of history. As it stands today, the modern Christian climate remains heavily denominationally divided. So as a capital-c Church, are we not holy?
Approaching Warner’s claim critically tends to disregard or dismiss it, when historically the revelation, whether from the Lord or crafted out of Warner’s perception of the situation, undoubtedly served grander purposes. To be sure, the claim had (and still has) its strengths. It enabled Warner to forge relationships with some denominations and organizations—including Mennonites and Holiness groups—while at the same time arguing for the abolishment of thinking along sectarian lines. As an example, Warner’s desire to remain true to the January 1878 revelation eventually resulted in a Gospel Trumpet declaration that “now we wish to announce to all that we wish to co-operate with all Christians, as such, in saving souls—but forever withdraw from the organisms that uphold and endorse sects and denominations in the body of Christ.”[5] This June 1881 proclamation was a watershed moment for the early Church of God movement, and it would not have been possible if Warner and others did not actively seek to fulfill the January 1878 revelation, which served to project the movement’s grand vision. Even today, when paraphrased, we might say that, “We cannot be the church that God intended when we elect to segregate ourselves ideologically and prioritize our differences among the most important foci of our ministry.” In that sense, Warner revealed (or had revealed to him) a timeless truth.
Ultimately, the historical interpretation of Warner’s January 1878 revelation lies in its ability to produce positive effects for the Church. In that light, Warner’s mission was a revolutionary success. This doesn’t rubber stamp his tactics or excuse his overly dismissive, damnation-centered attitude toward honest followers of Christ who happened to claim denominational faiths. However, we have to conclude that God used the faulty comprehension of his fallible followers to address the burgeoning problems of each period of history and produce ultimate good for his Church body.
[1] John W. V. Smith and Merle D. Strege, The Quest for Holiness & Unity, 2nd ed. (Anderson, IN: Warner Press, 2009), 46.
I’ve been reading an evangelical ecclesiology (how you understand “church”) book, and ran across a small section about women in the community of the church.
