Archive - June, 2010

The Third Way, Part 3 (of 5)

June 30, 2010 in Discipleship with 3 Comments

We’re tossing around an idea tentatively called The Third Way. Back story is here. Basic idea is here. Insight from Pastor Zahnd is here.

But maybe part of this new life that Jesus asks us to live isn’t about right or wrong. Maybe it’s about Christ.

Jesus didn’t stop with talking about this, though. He lived His own sermon.

On several occasions, Jesus enters the home of, and even sits to eat with, “sinners” (Matthew 9:11-13, Mark 2:15-17, Luke 15:1-7, Luke 19:5-10). Matthew Henry’s Commentary points out that the Pharisees would have interpreted Psalm 1:1 and 119:115 as a case against associating with sinners in order to maintain holiness. They accused Jesus of defiling Himself and, in effect, raised the question of holiness.

But Jesus neither repents nor defends His actions. He points to a different way of thinking. This is not about your holiness or your doctrine, it’s about mercy and the knowledge of God.

Jesus also irritates the holiness authorities by “working” on the Sabbath (Matthew12:1-8, 9-13, Mark 2:23-28, 3:1-6, Luke 6:1-5, 6-10). The Old Testament law pronounced death on anyone who worked on the Sabbath (Exodus 31:15). This wasn’t just about holiness, this was serious business about keeping the law.

Again, Jesus doesn’t really answer the accusation, but tries to open their eyes to a new mindset.

In both situations the religious elite were looking for “Right” or “Wrong,” and Jesus gave them neither.

We are called to be holy, and the Sabbath is a commandment handed down from God, and I think Jesus didn’t want to belittle either of those things. They’re godly and in a sense they are right.

But I think Jesus is trying to open our eyes to a third answer that we have a hard time recognizing on our own because life is easier when everything is True/False, and because religion can be used for our own purposes when there are no shades of gray.

Life is not True/False and our faith should be the whirlwind that brings us to a colorful new world, and I think that Jesus is applying palm to forehead and trying to show us that it’s not just about Right vs. Wrong. It’s not just about your clean slate or your good score.

It’s about love, even when love is unreciprocated and unwanted. It’s about mercy, even when mercy is unjust and undeserved. It’s about living outside of the script society wants to hand you, and living counter-intuitively out of love of God and love of people … even people who are wrong.

The Third Way, Part 2.5

June 29, 2010 in Discipleship with 0 Comments

Sorry about the lapse in conversation. I was at Kids’ Camp last week and didn’t get enough posts scheduled before I left.

In the meantime, though, I’ve been catching up on a couple Word of Life Church podcasts. Pastor Zahnd is going through the Sermon on the Mount and it goes without saying that he’s much smarter than I.

On the 13th (you can listen to it here, and I highly recommend it), he was in Matthew 5:38-42 and it was brilliant as always.

Among other things, he explained the bit about going two miles.

The Romans had their soldiers and their roads. They, apparently, invented mile markers. The soldiers had packs that weighed roughly 60 pounds, that they took with them everywhere and it was law that if a soldier asked a non-citizen to carry his pack for him that person HAD to comply for one mile.

The lesson is similar, but a right light is interesting.

I can’t imagine how annoying, how humiliating, that would have been. People were out doing business or taking care of their families or whatever, and some Roman soldier snarls at the Jew to stop what he’s doing and carry his 60-pound bag for a mile.

So the real lesson with that particular verse is not so much, “Say yes when you have the right to say no,” although I think that sentiment still rings through Jesus’ teaching. The real lesson is to go further than the law requires – and for your enemy at that.

Pastor Zahnd even muses in his message about what that might have done to the Roman soldiers as Jesus’ disciples actually started to heed that instruction. The soldiers fully expect that the peon they just took advantage of will drop the bag and mutter some rude comment as he walks away to rejoin his family or continue his business. But what happened when the Jew said, “I got this. Let’s keep going.”? How many Roman soldiers refused the offer? How many felt bad about making them carry it for the first mile?

We talked about this a little when we met Fred in the parking lot, but this teaching – this idea I keep calling the Third Way – isn’t about being weak, although the world will see it as such. It’s about a subtle revolution born in love, strengthened among the grass roots and carried by the undercurrent.

The kingdom of God is not like an army. It’s like a seed.

A Eulogy

June 28, 2010 in Uncategorized with 0 Comments

Saturday afternoon
was warm
and bright,
a good day for a drive
and to be outside with friends.

A good day for gardening

God planted a garden
and He put man in it
to live in it
to meet with Him with unveiled faces
And now
when the mirror is shattered
and faces unveiled again
we plant gardens
and put men in them
to wait.

Saturday afternoon
was warm
and bright,
a good day to meet with friends
in a garden.

God planted a garden
and He put it in a man
to tend and keep
the secret places
of his heart
to meet with Him
And now
it is unnecessary.

At the end of a season
the Gardener harvests His fruit
and collects seed
for the next season.

Saturday afternoon
was warm
and bright,
and we planted a man.
Where there is good fruit
there is good seed
and good seed
always breaks the surface
in the right light.

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