Here’s a fascinating article from the New York Times on how some of the world’s leading designers are using their skills to develop innovative products that benefit the world’s poorest members…
Like a 20-gallon jerry can you can roll…
Or a drinking filter (looks like a giant straw) you can use to purify water as you drink…
Maybe this is why God blesses some people with remarkable amounts of ingenuity.
“My kingdom,” said Jesus, “is not of this world” (John 18:36).
It was good enough for Pilate… so, naturally, it belongs on a T-shirt, like the one I once saw at a Christian retail show.
The question is, do we know what these words mean?
For some, the phrase “not of this world” draws a hard line of separation between the “spiritual” and “secular” worlds. The assumption being that spiritual equals good, while secular equals bad.
A letter from the apostle John (who also recorded Jesus’ “not of this world” comment) is sometimes quoted in support of this idea:
Do not love the world or anything in the world. If you love the world, love for the Father is not in you. For everything in the world—the cravings of sinful people, the lust of their eyes and their boasting about what they have and do—comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever.
— 1 John 2:15-17 (TNIV)
Along similar lines, some think the phrase “not of this world” indicates a heavenly, eternal life—as distinct from this earthly, temporal life. Which may be why some Christians like to sing, “This world is not my home / I’m just passing through…”
But what if that’s not what “not of this world” means? What if this world is our home and we’re not just passing through?
Come to think of it, “the world” referred to by John has to be something different… unless the psalmist was wrong when he wrote:
The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it,
the world, and all who live in it…
— Psalm 24:1 (TNIV)
(Incidentally, Paul uses Psalm 24:1 to argue that early Christians were free to eat meat sold at the public market—meat that likely had been sacrificed to a pagan god before being sold to the masses.)
The concept of separating sacred from secular (and spiritual from physical) is not new. During the early days of Christianity, it was called Gnosticism. The New Testament writers and early church fathers rejected this separation as heresy.
But there is an even older idea than Gnosticism; it’s the notion that God made the world good. It is as old as creation itself. In the opening chapter of the Bible, God sees that his creation is “good” not once, but seven times. In the Jewish context, the use of the number seven is anything but arbitrary. The number seven indicates that creation is good in a complete and total sense; it is exactly as God wants it to be. And no amount of sin and darkness can completely erase that kind of good—the kind that comes from an all-powerful, all-loving God.
If this world and everything in it belong to God, like the psalmist believed, then it doesn’t seem right to make a distinction between “sacred” and “secular.” It’s all God’s, so it’s all sacred.
So what does it mean to be “not of this world”?
Let’s go back to the context of John 18:36. What is Jesus talking about? His kingdom. Who is he talking to? Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea. What prompted Jesus to say his kingdom was “not of this world”? Pilate asked him if he considered himself king of the Jews.
What’s more, Jesus went on to say, “If [my kingdom were of this world], my servants would fight to prevent my arrest…” [emphasis added]
For Jesus, the contrast is not between sacred and secular; it’s not between physical and spiritual. It’s between the powerful and the powerless. Between the violent and the nonviolent. Between those who rule at the expense of the poor and those who serve on their behalf. Between those who deify human power (as the Romans did with their emperors) and those who recognize God is the only one with any real power.
What makes Jesus’ kingdom “not of this world” is precisely the fact that his servants will not fight to prevent his arrest. They will not use their power against others; they will not resort to violence. They do not swallow the Roman ideology of “peace through victory” but instead pursue peace through justice, salvation, redemption, and mercy.
When John warns us against the love of the world and all that comes with it—the cravings of sinful people, the lust of their eyes, and boasting about what they have and do—maybe what he’s warning us against is the love of power. The addiction to our own self-importance and our ability to control others.
Maybe, in the end, we are called to love the world—not the world as it is now, but the world as God sees it and means it to be.
This is Gamla.
Carved into a steep hill northeast of Galilee, Gamla gave birth to the Jewish Zealot movement, which came on the scene around the same time as Jesus.
Zealots demanded strict adherence to the law and total separation from anyone who believed otherwise.
To them, the presence of an occupying army in the Promised Land, particularly a pagan occupying army, was unacceptable. It was to be resisted by any means necessary. Zealot assassins roamed the streets of Galilee by night, using small daggers called sicarii to assassinate their enemies: Roman officials and their collaborators, Gentile and Jewish. Zealots believed the sword was the primary instrument of God’s kingdom.
From their hilltop fortress of Gamla, the Zealots looked across the Sea of Galilee and saw, on the opposite shore, Tiberias.
Tiberias was established during Jesus’ lifetime—an entire city built by Herod Antipas (ruler of Galilee) to honor Rome’s new emperor, Tiberius.
The city Tiberias was home to the Herodians, those loyal to the family of Herod—those who curried favor with Rome. Herodians didn’t believe in God’s kingdom; they were too busy building their own. Most religious Jews refused to set foot in Tiberias.
The Herodian approach to Roman occupation was to make the best of it… and, if they could, make a buck from it.
Two extremes, literally on opposite shores of the sea. Caught in between, on the northern edge of Galilee, was Capernaum—home base, as it were, for Jesus and his disciples.
While the Herodians loved their friends (the ones they could benefit from, anyway) and the Zealots hated their enemies, Jesus climbed a hill between Tiberias and Gamla and taught:
Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven.
—Matthew 5:44-45 (TNIV)
While Zealots resisted oppression with violence and Herodians sought to cash in on the situation, Jesus taught:
Do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also. And if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well. If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles.
—Matthew 5:39-41 (TNIV)
Jesus stood between the two extremes and offered a third way. He rejected both the violent, separatist impulse of the Zealots and the accommodating, opportunistic impulse of the Herodions. Instead, he told his followers to undermine evil with love. Not a wimpy, passive love that involves being everybody’s doormat. But a love that seizes the initiative, reveals oppression for what it really is, and always leaves the door open for the oppressor to repent.
Exploring the theological and political significance of Jesus’ command to go the extra mile, Walter Wink once wrote:
A soldier could impress a civilian to carry his pack one mile only; to force the civilian to go further carried with it severe penalties under military law… Nevertheless, this levy was a bitter reminder to the Jews that they were a subject people even in the Promised Land.
To this proud but subjugated people Jesus does not counsel revolt. One does not “befriend” the soldier, draw him aside, and drive a knife into his ribs. Jesus was keenly aware of the futility of armed revolt against Roman imperial might. He minced no words about it, though it must have cost him support from the revolutionary factions.
But why walk the second mile? Is this not to rebound to the opposite extreme: aiding and abetting the enemy? Not at all. The question here… is how the oppressed can recover the initiative, how they can assert their human dignity in a situation that cannot for the time being be changed. The rules are Caesar’s but not how one responds to the rules. The response is God’s, and Caesar has no power over that.
Imagine then the soldier’s surprise when, at the next mile marker, he reluctantly reaches to assume his pack (sixty-five to eighty-five pounds in full gear). You say, “Oh no, let me carry it another mile.” Normally he has to coerce your kinsmen to carry his pack; now you do it cheerfully and will not stop! Is this a provocation? Are you insulting his strength? Being kind? Trying to get him disciplined for seeming to make you go farther then you should? Are you planning to file a complaint? To create trouble?
From a situation of servile impressment, you have once more seized the initiative. You have taken back the power of choice. The soldier is thrown off-balance by being deprived of the predictability of your response. Imagine the hilarious situation of a Roman infantryman pleading with a Jew, “Aw, come on, please give me back my pack!” The humor of this scene may escape those who picture it through sanctimonious eyes. It could scarcely, however, have been lost on Jesus’ hearers, who must have delighted in the prospect of thus discomfiting their oppressors.
Some readers may object to the idea of discomfiting the soldier or embarrassing the creditor. But can people engaged in oppressive acts repent unless made uncomfortable with their actions? There is, admittedly, the danger of using nonviolence as a tactic of revenge and humiliation. There is also, at the opposite extreme, an equal danger of sentimentality and softness that confuses the uncompromising love of Jesus with being nice. Loving confrontation can free both the oppressed from docility and the oppressor from sin.
Maybe, as followers of Jesus, we are called to be people of the third way. People who transcend categories, stereotypes, and extremes. People who are not owned by one ideology, perspective, or party. People who rise above polarization to find creative, compelling ways to bring bits of heaven to earth.
Two final thoughts.
First, I noticed today (for the first time) the connection in Matthew 5:44-45 between loving our enemies and being children of God. Many in Jesus’ day assumed they were automatically God’s people because of their lineage—their ethnic connection to Abraham. They saw themselves as the elect, the chosen, the predestined. This way of thinking encouraged an “us versus them” mentality that drove the Zealots to violence.
There were, doubtless, Zealots (or at least Zealot sympathizers) in Jesus’ audience during the Sermon on the Mount. Imagine how shocking it was for them to hear, in effect, “If you want to be God’s children, then you must learn to love your enemies.”
What if being the people of God is defined not by how well we separate ourselves from those who don’t believe as we do, but by how well we love those who don’t believe as we do?
Last, it’s worth remembering that neither Zealot nor Herodian lasted through the end of the first century. The Herodians, lost in the pursuit of power and comfort, cast their lot with the powers of the moment—the family of Herod. After the first century, there were no more Herods to benefit from.
As for the Zealots, in A.D. 67, Rome laid siege to Gamla, breaching the city wall and killing thousands. Those who survived the attack committed mass suicide, jumping off cliffs above the village. Later, the Zealots briefly seized control of Jerusalem and ruled with a brutality surpassing that of their enemies. Their legacy is a reminder that violence breeds only more violence. Extremism breeds more extremism. Oppression breeds more oppression.
Maybe, as followers of Jesus, we are called to break the cycle. Maybe we are called to be people of the third way.
I’ve gotten some interesting (mostly positive) responses to my article in 850 Words of RELEVANT earlier this week.
Toby had this to say:
I realize I’m a day late in commenting, but I have to wonder about your statement about Christianity upending the known world.
I realize it did, but only for a short time. Because it seems, from history, that Christianity because much like it’s culture, and Romanish after the first century and it’s progress was stunted and lamed much.
So, was the Jesus-cult a flash in the pan? Did it have it’s time in the first and early second century and died off becoming what we know it is today through Romanism? Do you see first century Jesus-cult being revived any time else in history? Now?
It’s true that sometime around the 4th century A.D., Christianity started looking more like Rome and less like Jesus. This had a lot to do with Constantine, emperor of Rome from 280-337.
Constantine was famous for legalizing Christianity in 313—after years of on-again, off-again state-sponsored persecution. But this move had more to do with politics than piety, and it had major implications for the Jesus movement.
First, under Constantine’s influence, some pagan elements were blended with Christianity. It just so happens that in the Roman imperial cult, Constantine was often associated with Sol Invictus, the sun god. In the Roman pantheon, Sol Invictus was synonymous with Mithra. And it just so happens that around this time, people began celebrating Jesus’ birth on December 25, the date previously recognized as Mithra’s birthday.
Second, after A.D. 313, the church got its first taste of political and military power. And in some ways, yes, the church has never been the same since. A movement that once drew thousands by undermining society’s power structures and hierarchies now became intimately connected to these power structures. As a result, the church often traded the natural appeal of Jesus’ message for conversion by coercion.
I believe the church is at its best when it serves from a position of weakness, when it chooses the power of love and rejects the love of power. So yes, I think that in many ways the church has lost much of its early power… except for one thing. And perhaps only one thing.
Jesus hasn’t given up on the church yet.
Jesus promised that not even the gates of death would overcome the church. Elsewhere the scriptures describe the church as Jesus’ body. And however much we may abuse his body, it is still just that—his body.
Another idea found in the scriptures is that of a remnant—that no matter how bad things get with God’s people, there’s always a group that stays faithful to him. This is Israel’s story more than once in the Hebrew scriptures.
So while some of the church may lose itself in the pursuit of power, there are remnants of hope—pockets of redemption, where we see God’s kingdom breaking through even today. I think churches like Mars Hill in Grand Rapids, Michigan are examples of this. (Full disclosure: my wife and I belonged to Mars Hill for three years before moving to Seattle.) These are churches where that same subversive, inclusive spirit is alive and well, inviting all to come and experience Jesus. Places where the poor are taken care of, the oppressed find refuge, and justice is central to the gospel.
The reason I wrote the article for RELEVANT was because I feel like we spend so much time arguing for what we believe and holding on to what power that we think we have that we forget that arguing and fighting for power cannot change the world. If we want to do that, we need to remember what it was about the early church that changed the world… and that was, I believe, a God who is for us and a church that is for everybody.
Over the weekend my wife and I visited Butchart Gardens in British Columbia. It’s one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been to.
Here’s what it looked like 100 years ago…
The gardens started as a quarry on limestone-rich Vancouver Island, providing raw materials for cement production. It wasn’t long until the limestone supply was exhausted, and all that remained was a desolate patch of spent earth.
However, Jennie Butchart (the wife of the cement maker) decided to invest new life into this plot of land, using topsoil from nearby farms to create a garden out of an old quarry.
One hundred years later, this is what it looks like…
I don’t know whether Jennie Butchart considered herself a follower of Jesus. But I think what she did is exactly what Christians are called to do—literally and figuratively, physically and spiritually.
Butchart Gardens is, in a small way, a reenactment of the resurrection—bringing new life where before there was only death. Bringing renewal and vitality where there was once just a used-up piece of land. Restoring the connection between us and the rest of God’s creation.
Whether we’re talking about saving souls or saving the planet, this is a biblical idea. I like the way Rob Bell puts it in his newest book, Sex God:
We’re disconnected from the earth. And we know it. Or at least we can feel it… Many people live in air-conditioned houses and apartments. We alter our air with electric machines. We spend vast sums of money and energy to change our air. And we drive in air-conditioned cars—the 8 percent of us in the world who have cars—to air-conditioned schools and offices and stores with tile floors and fluorescent lights.
It’s even possible to go days without spending any significant time outside. And it’s still considered living. It’s easy to go for weeks and maybe even years without ever actualy plunging your hands into soil. Into earth. Into dirt.
And when we don’t plunge our hands into the earth, into God’s creation, we lose not only our connection to it… we lose our sense of wonder.
Places like Butchart Gardens are beautiful metaphors for spiritual rebirth. But they’re way more than that, too. They remind us that God of our souls is also the God of rocks and dirt. The God who celebrates when someone gives their heart to him is the same God who delights when a flower blooms.
Christians, then, should be people who see not just the present beauty of creation, but the potential for renewal and restoration where beauty has been lost—in the same way that God sees the potential for renewal and restoration in us.
Many of us need to rediscover our sense of wonder… the sense of possibility that’s captured so well by the lyrics of an Eliot Morris song:
All things are new in this colorful world
Gray is to blue in this colorful world
There’s so much to do in this colorful world
— “This Colorful World,” What’s Mine Is Yours (2006)
On the way to Victoria, BC…
At Butchart Gardens…
Tomorrow (Saturday) is the Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive. 1 in 10 Americans are at risk of hunger, while about 1 in 100 actually go hungry. This may be small compared to places like Sub-Saharan Africa, where 1 in 3 go hungry. But we’re a country that throws away nearly 100 billion pounds of food per year (and that’s just restaurants). We have what it takes to end hunger—both here and abroad. To learn more about tomorrow’s food drive, click here.
Yesterday archaeologists announced the discovery of what they believe is Herod’s tomb in his fortress-palace outside Jerusalem, known as the Herodion. Herod the Great ruled Judea (on behalf of Rome) at the time of Jesus’ birth.
To build his palace, Herod performed one of the most amazing architectural feats of his day. He sawed the top off of one mountain and leveled another mountain altogether.
It may have been the sight of the Herodion that inspired one of Jesus’ most memorable teachings about faith:
[Jesus] replied… “Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.” —Matthew 17:20 (TNIV)
But there were a few crucial differences between the mountain-moving powers of Herod and Jesus.
The mountain-moving power of Herod was, by nature, oppressive—his accomplishments made possible only by the use of slave labor. The mountain-moving power of Jesus was liberating; for people like the possessed child in Matthew 17:14-20, it brought healing and deliverance from oppression.
The mountain-moving power of Herod was self-serving; the Herodion was meant to be a massive reminder of Herod’s own greatness. The mountain-moving power of Jesus was of an entirely different order. It was meant to be used for the benefit of those who, like the possessed child, had no power of their own.
Last… the mountain-moving power of Herod died with him. The Herodion was supposed to be a lasting monument to his power, one that would survive long after Herod was dead. But it’s just that—a monument and nothing more. The mountain-moving power of Jesus, on the other hand, could not be killed—not even by the most powerful empire on earth.
It’s been a while, but I finally posted to the TNIV Truth blog again. Just a short blurb about Rick Warren and the TNIV…
The other day, one of my coworkers shared an article called “The Art of Powerful Questions.” Here’s an excerpt I really liked:
Questions open the door to dialogue and discovery. They are an invitation to creativity and breakthrough thinking. Questions can lead to movement and action on key issues; by generating creative insights, they can ignite change.
If asking good questions is so critical, why don’t most of us spend more of our time and energy on discovering and framing them? One reason may be that much of Western culture, and North American society in particular, focuses on having the “right answer” rather than discovering the “right question.”
Our educational system focuses more on memorization and rote answers than on the art of seeking new possibilities. We are rarely asked to discover compelling questions, nor are we taught why we should ask such questions in the first place. Quizzes, examinations, and aptitude tests all reinforce the value of correct answers. Is it any wonder that most of us are uncomfortable with not knowing?
Which got me thinking…
What if asking questions is the vital-yet-missing element of our prayers and our interactions with the scriptures? Have you ever noticed just how many people in the Bible question God? Not ordinary people asking polite questions, either… but the so-called heroes of the faith asking scandalizing questions like, “My God, why have you forsaken me?“
What if asking questions is worthwhile not just for the sake of finding answers? What if sometimes there are no answers? What if our quest for these elusive answers will end up like Job’s? Did you ever notice how in his story, when God shows up at last, he asks Job lots of rhetorical questions, then leaves—without ever answering Job’s question, why?
What if Jesus appreciated better than anyone the value of asking questions? Why is it that in the Gospels, more often than not his answer to a question is—annoyingly—a question? Conrad Gempf once pointed out that Jesus asks 50 different questions in the book of Mark alone (which records just 67 conversations).
What if followers of Jesus are people who never stop asking, never stop wondering, never stop exploring? The disciples asked Jesus plenty of questions—dumb questions, not-so-dumb questions…. Either way, they kept on asking, right up to the moment Jesus caught a ride back to heaven (Acts 1:6).
What if we’ve made an idol out of having all the right answers? Are we addicted to black-and-white, either-or thinking? And does this get in the way of knowing God?
What if God is more interested in followers who ask the right questions than those who have all the answers? Maybe this is why asking good questions—not having good answers—was the foundation of the Jewish educational experience. Scientist Isidor Isaac Rabi once said when he came home from school each day, his Jewish mother never asked, “What did you learn today?” Instead she wanted to know, “Did you ask any good questions today?” What if God delights in a good, honest question?
What if that’s the difference between understanding faith as a destination and seeing it as a journey, as a process of exploration and discovery? Maybe that’s why the writers of the Bible loved using “walk” as a metaphor for our relationship with God.
Maybe…
