Gary Anderson says sin has a history.  He’s not talking about the history of our personal sin — why we did it or what it’s enduring effects were.  He’s talking about the history of the way we talk about sin.  He says this is evident by the change of metaphors that are used to describe/define sin in the Old Testament.

He explains why this is significant by employing the philosophical thought of Riccouer, who argues that the meaning of words are derived from the metaphors we use when talking about them.  By way of example he takes the metaphors we use to describe the word argue.  The sorts of language we use when talking about arguing include:

• I destroyed his argument.
• I shared my perspective now you go.  Shoot!
• I dismantled her logic.
• I blew up her worldview.

All of the metaphors we use to describe the idea of arguing include war-like, violent imagery.  If instead we used dance metaphors to describe arguing, we would think of an argument much differently than we do.  If we said things like, “our argument last night was a waltz.”  Or, if we said, “we gracefully argued back and forth as a couple glides across the dance floor.”  Using this metaphor would change the way we understood arguing.  It would change the very definition of what it means to argue.  His point is that the metaphors we use in conjunction with a word imply the word’s inherent meaning.

Anderson applies this philosophical concept to sin in order to uncover what sin meant in the thought life of the Old Testament.  He says there is a history of the word sin because different metaphors were used at different during two different time periods.  The first is the pre-exilic time, and the second is the second-temple period, which included the time of Jesus.

Sin during the first period was associated with the metaphor of burden (e.g. on the day of Atonement the donkey was laden with a heavy burden, symbolically representing Israel’s sins, and sent away into the wilderness).  In the second period, the metaphors that are used include the imagery of debt.  When we sin, we go into debt to God.  By way of example he points to the language in Lev. 26ff about the debt the Israelites go into by not adhering to the law of every 7th year is a Sabbath for the land.  This was interpreted by Rabbis in the second temple period as talking about sin.  When they go into exile they have to pay back the debt to God by staying out of the land for 70 years.  The reason is that the land belongs to God, and by working the land on the seventh year they are stealing from God, which puts them into His debt.  He also points to Jesus use of debt language in the Lord’s prayer as the strongest evidence that Jesus thought of sin this way.

What I find really fascinating is the correlating definition of virtue associated with these two metaphors for sin.  For the burden metaphor, there isn’t really an associated opposite other than to unburden someone or something.  But if sin is thought of as a debt, then there is an opposite action that can be taken as a way to undo our debt.  You can pay back your debt.  If you are in God’s debt, virtue is a way to pay it down.

Anderson argues that this is primarily accomplished through almsgiving, giving money to the poor.  Throughout much of early church history, giving money to the poor was understood as a way of giving money to God himself, and therefore as a way to pay down our debt.  Interestingly, Jesus talks this way too.  In Matt. 25 he says that giving to the poor, the sick, and those who are hurting is equivalent with giving directly to Jesus.  He also says to multiple rich individuals that their path toward salvation and overcoming their sins was rooted in giving their money away to the poor.  This was so established in early Christianity that poor individuals would great their benefactors by saying: “Acquire merit in heaven through me!”

Our post-reformation inclinations violently revolt against the idea of paying down our debt of sin to God with anything that remotely represents “good works.”  We have been taught that Christ alone atones for our sins.  But Anderson points out that giving our money away is less about overcoming our debt and more an expression of faith.  When we give our money away we make a loan to God (Prov. 19:17), which means we become God’s creditors.  The root of the word creditor comes from the Latin word credere, which means to believe.  So, when you or I give our money to someone in need we loan our money to God.  Everyone who loans their money to someone believes in that person’s ability to pay it back.  Loaning our money to God is an act of faith in his ability to pay it back with the spiritual blessings of the kingdom of heaven, now and in the age to come.  That means giving our money away is less of a way to earn our salvation and more a way to express our faith in God.  It’s an investment in our heavenly treasuries that pay astronomically high rates of return.

Throughout the day, I’ve had countless Christians and particularly Christian leaders urging me and all their other social network connections to vote.  It’s left me wondering, is voting our Christian duty?

Surprisingly, theologians differ.  Some, characterized by the hard religious right (e.g. Dobson) and the progressive Christian left (e.g. Wallis) believe so.  They see voting, and political involvement more generally, to be one of the primary ways that Christians are called to transform the world.  Whether it be abortion legislation, gay marriage, poverty, or war, these groups ardently believe that Christians under under an ethical imperative to vote.  This is the way we influence and shape society, they argue.  We vote those into office who will enact the sort of laws that makes America a more compassionate and just place to live.  Others, like Stanely Hauerwas, argue for a sort of withdrawal from politics because the church should influence the world (and politicians) by living out a Kingdom of Heaven reality in the hear and now.  We shape the political process by exemplifying a better way.  Abstaining from voting for Hauerwas is a thoroughly political statement.

In his book, To Change the World, James David Hunter argues that all three are misguided.  They underestimate the power that ordinary people have outside the political process.  Hunter urges us to embrace the social power that we all have by following in the footsteps of Jesus.  He exerted tremendous world-changing power and influence without being dependent on the political process.

I’m with Hunter.  Voting isn’t our Christian duty, but I would still urge Christians to vote.  Voting communicates a fundamental Christian truth that every human life has worth, and every human voice should be heard.

Traditionally, voting has been a means of oppression.  Women, slaves and other ethnic outsiders have been denied their right to vote as a way of discounting their place in society.  Now that most of these barriers have been removed, voting is an elemental way we can celebrate the inherent dignity and worth of every person regardless of race, gender, class or any other societal barrier that usually differentiates people.  The wealthy business man’s vote doesn’t count any more than the homeless woman’s vote, and the Ivy-League educated professor’s vote counts just the same as the factory worker’s.  Voting is a beautiful expression of the intrinsic value of every human life.

And that’s why I voted today.  I didn’t vote because my hope for a better world lies in the hands of some politician or the political process.  My hope is in Christ alone.  But I still voted, because in voting I celebrate the privilege our country affords every individual.  I celebrate the equality of every life represented in every vote.  I hope you voted too.

Image from flickr.

Glenn Beck is a polarizing figure. People seem to land in one of two camps — they either love him or loathe him.  He’s either the savior of our democratic state or a catalyst to toxic political debates around the country.  Just a week ago, he held a rally that drew thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, to Wasington D.C. on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.  It’s clear that a large percentage of the country loves Beck’s message.

What surprised me from the articles I’ve read and the video segments I’ve seen, is how religious the rally was.  Beck was calling on Americans to restore honor to our country by getting serious about God again.  He discouraged people from bringing placards that backed politicians.  He didn’t want this to be a political rally.  It was about taking our country back.  It was about restoring honor.  It was about becoming more moral.  They celebrated the good in America’s history and they honored America’s troops all with gratitude to God.

An article on Beck’s website describes what Beck is doing and the movement he is leading this way:

Beck is building solidarity and cultural confidence in America, its Constitution, its military heritage, its freedom. This is a vision that is despised by people who have long held the commanding heights of the culture, but it is obviously alive and kicking. Beck is creating positive themes of unity and patriotism and freedom and independence (Glenn Beck’s Website)

He is “building solidarity and cultural confidence in America.”  Beck is telling us that we are good.  He is saying that the high points in our history far outstrip the low points.  He is saying that God has particularly blessed America.  Our history is good and our potential for a brighter tomorrow is good.  He is saying, “America, believe in yourself and believe that God has blessed us and then get out there and be moral.  Work hard, make money, support the military, and don’t let the government take over control of our lives.”  It’s a message that is simultaneously hopeful and encouraging.   It is a message that says that we the people are good while they the politicians are bad.  It’s a message that says, if we would only be ourselves, our true selves, as we’ve always been at our core, then we could reclaim and restore our original honor.

This past week I preached on Matt. 22:16-22.  It’s the passage where the Pharisees ask Jesus whether it’s okay to pay taxes to Caesar or not.  Jesus highlights the idolatrous nature of the coin (and money) and then says, give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.  As I read the passage and prepared my sermon, Glenn Beck and all those who cry out against the government and against it’s ever increasing slide towards socialism came to mind.  In this story, the Pharisees are lamenting the taxes they have to pay to the Roman government.   They come to Jesus to confirm the idea that God is against tyrannical governments.  It’s the same question that Beck and many of his followers are asking.  The sentiment portrayed by many of Beck’s followers is strikingly similar to that of the Pharisees’ question.  One rally attender put it this way:

Ryan Townsend, 35, of Parkersburg, W.Va., said he came Saturday because, “I’m not going to sit idly by while tyranny and socialism replace our Constitution.” (Washington Post)

The Jews of Jesus day hated to pay their taxes just as much as Ryan Townsend.  They also considered themselves to be under the oppression of a tyrant, and they similarly saw the power of the tyrant expressed in the bondage they felt to paying taxes.  That’s why they posed this question to Jesus:

“Tell us, then, what you think. Is it lawful to pay taxes to Caesar, or not?”” (Matthew 22:17 ESV)

The Pharisees and many of the Jews assumed that in order to restore honor to themselves and to their nation, they would have to stop paying taxes.  But surprisingly, Jesus says is, pay your taxes.  The level of importance you place in that coin is idolatrous.  By paying your taxes you will be relieving yourself of the burden of carrying that idolatrous coin around.   He is saying, you should pay your taxes even if your government is as tyrannical as the Roman Empire and it’s leader is as great a delusional megalomaniac as Tiberius Caesar, who happened to think he was divine.  Jesus says, whether your leader is Tiberius Caesar or Barak Obama, and whether your government is democratic, tyrannical or socialist, “Pay your taxes!”

Don’t pay them because your hope and trust is in Caesar.  Don’t pay them because your identity and hope for the future is in your government.  Pay them because you can still give to God what is God’s even while you give to Caesar what is Caesar’s.  You can pay your income tax and still have everything you need to give to God what is God’s.  You can pay your taxes and still have a full and content life as well as a hopeful future.  You don’t need all your income to be happy.  You don’t need all your money to have worth.  Jesus championed the radical idea that you don’t need to avoid taxes or live under a just government to restore your honor.

But so long as we are obsessed with income tax brackets we are just like the Pharisees.  We are missing the point.  We love money and think that we need it to be happy.  Jesus is trying to set us free from our bondage to money.  He is proclaiming the radical message that you and I can be happy whether we are rich or poor.  Whether we pay taxes or not, we can still give to God what is God’s.

I just came across an article about a male Gordon-Conwell student (the seminary I attended) who allegedly broke into a female student’s dorm room and setup a video camera with the intent of filming her.  You can read about it on the Boston Herald or the Salem News sites.  I feel badly for this young woman.  I can’t imagine the feeling of invasion of privacy and the lingering effects of this incident.  I also feel badly for the student that broke into her room.  He’s clearly a troubled person who is dealing with some difficult desires that led him to make a life-altering decision — very sad.

What I find interesting is the responses to this story in the comment section on these two newspapers’ sites.  There is a sense of derision and mocking aimed at this young man.  There is even a sense of delight in reveling in his downfall as a person seeking pastoral office.  To be honest, I’m not sure what to think.  I get why people feel this way.  They think judgmental evangelicals are just as sinful as everyone else, and therefore they should keep their mouths shut.  And, I agree that this guy shouldn’t be doing this or anything like it, but I’m not surprised it happened.  I also don’t think this makes pastors who talk about sin insincere or necessarily hypocritical.   As a clergy member myself, I’m aware of the standard to which I feel called, but I’m also aware of the fact that I don’t measure up.

I’ve never broken into another person’s room to film them (nor done anything illegal), but there are undeniable ways that I fall short of God’s standard.   If my qualification for ministry was based on my personal performance, I’d be out of a job.  If I had to master every sin before I talked about it, there’d be a lot of things I could never preach on.  I’m not God.  I’m not perfect.  I sin, sometimes boldly.  What am I to do?  What are clergy to do?

Most hide it.  They put forward a portrait of perfection, but as I mentioned in my last post hiding it makes things worse, because hiding it gives the sin more power.  It isolates people and prevents them from receiving grace.  What we, the church, need to do is come to terms with the fact that our clergy are just as sinful as the rest of the world.  Our desires are just as dark and perverse as everyone else’s.   We’re broken too.  My hope is only that our hearts are receptive enough to grace and that we’ve experienced a deep enough level of transformation that we are safe to lead and wise enough to put parameters in place that protect us from personal pitfalls.

We need to be honest about our clergy, and honest about God.  This is no surprise to God, and it’s no disqualifier for grace.  My hope is that churches can be honest about sin so that they are able to call people to repentance, and serious enough about grace to provide a place that’s safe enough for confession and repentance to happen.   Often times this culture starts in seminary.  Pastors try to replicate the culture they experienced in seminary in the churches they lead.  Gordon-Conwell was a place that was safe enough for me to confess and experience grace while I was there, but I wonder if it was for this student.   For the sake of our pastors and the future churches they lead, I hope he is the exception.  My prayers are with the GCTS community.

“All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” ~ Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina

This, the opening line to Tolstoy’s novel, Anna Karenina, is packed full of meaning, and the rest of the book expounds in story form what he means.   We read of one miserable family owing its pain to the self-absorption of the husband.  In another, it’s because of the internal angst of a middle-aged wife that drives her into the arms of a young man.  In another, it’s the insatiable desire for success of the politician husband.  Each family is truly uniquely miserable in its own way.

But is it true that all happy families are alike?  Is it true that there is a model for how to be a family, and the degree to which a family resembles that model dictates the level of happiness the family will experience?

My hunch is that Tolstoy is correct.  I believe that God has created families to relate in a certain way.  Happy families relate to one another the way the Godhead relates to itself.  Happy families love one another the way God loves others.  They are full of sacrificial love and concern for the well being of the each other.  Their relationships are rooted in commitment, and the culture is one of honesty and grace.  In these systems, health, not perfection, is possible, and happiness can emerge.

The problem that Tolstoy so eloquently highlights through his story-telling is that the “happy-family” model is unnatural for us.  We don’t just fall into it.  We have to work at it.  Monogamy is a commitment we have to stick to, and it requires the disciplining of our passions.  Sacrificial service towards our spouses and our children is inconvenient and at times demands the delaying of our dreams.  Love often times looks more like death than it does like lust.  Following the “happy-family” model is hard work and it takes discipline.

But as I read through Anna Karenina and see the truth about families in its pages, it’s obvious that this hard work is well worth it.  Whenever we veer from God’s path of familial happiness, the pain is inevitable, if sometimes delayed.

Here are some clips from the movie:
American Nazi Gathering:

God Hates America:

Attack on US Troops:

Mideast Conflict:

These are extreme examples of hatred.  They show individuals who define themselves by who they hate as well as the lamentable consequences of years of conflict that inevitably escalate into war.  Bigotry and war are profoundly sad, but it’s just as sad to see hatred manifested in the petty grudges we carry, the gossip we promulgate, and the slander we say.  If we reflect God primarily in the way we relate to others, then hatred is the antithesis of being human, and acting on that hatred is demonic.

But it is in all of us.  We all hate, and that’s what makes community so complicated.  The trick is to forgive, and not base our love for the other person in community on how much they deserve it, because they usually don’t.  This is what makes Christian community unique — I love Jim, not because of who Jim is, but because of who Jesus is.  Jesus loves Jim, and he is in Jim working for the salvation and healing of Jim.  In all our relationships, we treat one another the way would treat Jesus.  Jesus loves our neighbor with the same unconditional love with which he loves you and me.  Christian community is founded on this unconditional love that refuses to hate no matter how justifiable that hatred seems.  We come together in the name of Christ, forgiving one another just as Jesus forgave us.

ON THE MORNING OF Thursday, April 10, 2003, Donald Rumsfeld’s Pentagon prepared a top-secret briefing for George W. Bush. This document, known as the Worldwide Intelligence Update, was a daily digest of critical military intelligence so classified that it circulated among only a handful of Pentagon leaders and the president; Rumsfeld himself often delivered it, by hand, to the White House. The briefing’s cover sheet generally featured triumphant, color images from the previous days’ war efforts: On this particular morning, it showed the statue of Saddam Hussein being pulled down in Firdos Square, a grateful Iraqi child kissing an American soldier, and jubilant crowds thronging the streets of newly liberated Baghdad. And above these images, and just below the headline SECRETARY OF DEFENSE, was a quote that may have raised some eyebrows. It came from the Bible, from the book of Psalms: “Behold, the eye of the Lord is on those who fear Him…To deliver their soul from death.”

This mixing of Crusades-like messaging with war imagery, which until now has not been revealed, had become routine. On March 31, a U.S. tank roared through the desert beneath a quote from Ephesians: “Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.” On April 7, Saddam Hussein struck a dictatorial pose, under this passage from the First Epistle of Peter: “It is God’s will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish men.” (To see these and more Bush-administration intelligence cover sheets, visit GQ.com’s exclusive slideshow).

…

But the Pentagon’s top officials were apparently unconcerned about the effect such a disclosure might have on the conduct of the war or on Bush’s public standing. When colleagues complained to Shaffer that including a religious message with an intelligence briefing seemed inappropriate, Shaffer politely informed them that the practice would continue, because “my seniors”—JCS chairman Richard Myers, Rumsfeld, and the commander in chief himself—appreciated the cover pages.

A sadly revealing survey has just been released that found evangelical Christians are the most likely group to support torture.  

White evangelical Protestants were the religious group most likely to say torture is often or sometimes justified — more than six in 10 supported it. People unaffiliated with any religious organization were least likely to back it. Only four in 10 of them did.

How ironic?  Christianity was founded on the person and work of Jesus Christ who showed us the way to defeat evil in the world is not through the perpetration of violence but the absorption of it.  The way we overcome it is embodied in Jesus’ death on the cross, sacrificially laying down our life for one another.  Torture is the antitheses of Christian ethics.  It says, my life is more valuable than yours and so I will force you to lay down your life for my well being.  This is truly a lamentable finding, and is indicative of why so many people are leaving the church.

This book is written to challenge churches to avoid become places filled with nice people, pastors, and purposes.  Too often in the American church landscape, the church co-opts the language and issues of the day and then simply rephrases them in Christian speak.  They don’t say anything too controversial or counter-cultural.  Willimon and Hauerwas challenge the church to be a community of resident aliens—a colony or outpost of heaven here on earth—not in a way that withdraws from the world, but in a way that is truly unique in its composition.  “The overriding political task of the church is to be the community of the cross” (pg. 47) 

In essence, they call the local church community to be truth-tellers.  We should have the guts to speak and act as God is.  They point to the Sermon on the Mount for a description of God’s vision for his community.  And they point to the story of Anninias and Saphira as an example of what it looks like to be truth-tellers.  Peter valued corporate truthy-ness to individual well-being.  The Christian community is not primarily about making people feel good or meeting felt needs.  It is about being a community that represents and proclaims God’s vision for humanity.

I loved this book, and it is a great reminder to me.  They see profound purpose in the church.  This book reminded me both how important and how powerful the local church can be.

Joking aside, I believe this year’s ‘the worst job in America’ honor goes to the Chief Executive Officer. The populist hostility toward the CEO continues to mount in inverse proportion the downward spiraling Dow. Our economy is in shambles (and getting worse) and everyone is laying the blame at the feet of highly compensated CEOs. The fury over the following stories makes this clear:

• AIG executives taking luxurious retreats
• the most sought after contingency in the $700 Billion bailout plan being ‘no golden parachutes’ for CEOs
• today the headline story on CNNs site ‘Auto CEOs flew private jets to seek bailout’

And as I listen to the numbers get recited on Larry King Live, I’ve gotta wonder what took us so long to get outraged? The GM CEO Rick Wagoner made $15.7 million last year. This was a year in which GM lost $39 billion dollars. The Ford CEO made $28 million in just four months on the job in 2007, a year in which Ford lost $12.7 billion. With all the families that are losing their jobs (or are poised to lose their jobs), one has to ask is this fair? Do these CEOs really add that much value to the company?

I think we are entering an era during which this will change. Ever since Reagan, America has increasingly subscribed to a trickle-down model of economics. I think we’ve reach some sort of tipping point and things are going to change. When everything was going well in the economic world, people didn’t care. Americans had been largely able to pursue their American Dream so they didn’t care what CEOs made. But now that 401Ks are in the dumps and hundreds of thousands of families are unemployed, these CEOs have to justify their exorbitant financial packages. They have to explain why they are being paid like gods, but are unable to control the economic future like a god.

The curtain has been pulled back and they look more like thieves than leaders. They are no longer cultural leaders (the ones asked to speak at conferences, the ones asked to lead church breakfasts, or the ones we hope our children would aspire to be). They are the morally abhorrent we curse at the dinner table. They are the despised of our culture. They are the object of unending media scrutiny and scorn. The CEO is the worst job in America, regardless of its compensation.

[Edit]
Maybe a form of leadership malpractice is the answer?
http://discussionleader.hbsp.com/kellerman/2008/11/leadership_malpractice.html