Fishing With Jesus

It was novelist Theodore Dreisler who wrote:

Assure a man that he has a soul and then frighten him with old wives tales as to what is to become of him afterwards, and you have hooked a fish, a mental slave.

What a neat quote! Wish I had said it.

But really, I think that sentiment is finally becoming somewhat a relic of the past.

With evangelical and conservative Christians doing more and more every day to bank those fires of Hell. They "spiritualizing" the flames. Why, many of then now tell us - with straight face and after centuries of fire and brimstone preaching - that Hell is really separation from God. The "wailing and gnashing of teeth" is descriptive of the pangs of conscience. Whatever.

Others well known Shepherds are sounding more positive all the time. Love will in the end win - probably, for the most part, maybe. Guys like Jonathan Edwards and John Calvin may have missed the mark by a tad. And I suppose Jesus was probably just having a bad day or momentary lapse of faithful optimism when he uttered those seldom discussed words:

How narrow is the gate, and strait is the way that leadeth to life: and few there are that find it! [Matthew 7:14, Douay-Rheims Bible]

How's that again, Jesus ... how many? Did you say "few"?

But the wide gate, death, apparently ain't such a bad thing after all. (Even if Jesus had quite a bit to say about the subject ... and if he thought of the fires of Hell as figurative, he sure did use a vivid example to make his point when he alluded to the very real flames of the Valley of Hinnom.)

It absolutely amazes me how so many people claim Jesus as their religious authority and then ignore so much of what he said.

So Jesus wants "fishers of men" and his fishermen have thrown away the bait. Interesting.

Why Militant Christians Should Be Voted Out Of Office

New York State Senator The Reverend Senator Ruben Diaz (not being sarcastic there, he bills himself as Reverend Senator Diaz on his personal blog and is a Pentecostal minister) is wearing as a "badge of honor" the distinction of being the only Democratic Senator to vote "no" on New York's recent marriage bill.

In speaking with the Christian Post he offers some tidbits of his pious wisdom. For example:

Pastors and religious leaders are supposed to remember that we are supposed to be Christians before being Democrats or being Republicans. Our responsibility is with Jesus and not with Democratic Party or Republican Party.

Now I want to throw out a thought here for consideration and ask whether or not it makes more sense. People should remember that they are humans first, before submitting to any religious, political, or philosophical position.

Ah yes, part of being human is recognizing that we humans are faulty and prone to mistaken thinking. We should always be vigilant about directing our thoughts in the right direction as best we are able. The problem with most people, it seems to me, is that they just don't think much. At some point they fix their ideas and convictions and instead of constantly weighing these against continuous input, they become stagnate. Should dogged stubbornness be considered a virtue?

When the religious convictions of some conflict with basic human values, we should remember first that we are all humans.

Belief about God is one of the most hotly contested subjects there is among humans. Therefore, it is unreasonable, not to mention impossible, to reach an agreement among everyone as to just what God's will (if indeed there is a God) is.

But that we are all humans with the same basic needs is beyond dispute.

When a militant Christian (or one of any militant religious philosophy) uses their government position to attempt to impose their personal convictions on others, it is wrong; it is against the very principles of the Constitution by which our nation is governed.

Senator Diaz goes on:

We should always think first as Christians. We should not be concerned if that person is Republican or Democrat. We should be concerned if that person has Christian values and go all the way for that person.

We have to learn that because Jesus said that who is against us is not with us, that who is for us is with us.

Well, sure, that is what people should do if they believe the United States should be a theocracy. But Jesus, as I have repeatedly endeavored to show, was a man who did not believe in democracy and had a very narrow and specific agenda. A debate about what Jesus would or would not want us to do is pointless. It is silly.

If we have elected officials whose concerns are more about What Would Jesus Do? than what our Constitution stands for, then I believe we have a serious problem. And in fact I do believe we have a serious problem in our country. I do believe the increasingly alarming mingling of religion and politics is a problem.

Senator Diaz continues:

I believe in the Bible. I believe in the End of Times and that all these things will come to be, that what is good will become bad and what bad will become good. Whenever I say this, people laugh at me and people make fun of me. I don't care because that is what I believe. I keep praying and keep believing.

That is fine, of course, as his personal religious philosophy. I disagree with it, but I defend his and everyone's right to hold whatever opinions they feel are the correct ones.

But the question with elected officials who hold similar opinions is this: Can such a person fairly represent all of his constituents?

It is impossible to be a militant Christian and a defender of religious and intellectual freedom at the same time.

I don't for a moment doubt Senator Diaz's sincerity. I just strongly feel that people who think the way he does are a threat to true freedom, are out of step with our nation's founding principles, and do not deserve to be and are not qualified to be representatives of the people.

What I Left Out Of Yesterday's Post

Had I not edited yesterday's post it would have been so long I doubt many would have made it to the end. The finished product stood on it's own, I believe, and is worthy of consideration. My main points were: (1) Jesus should be treated as the historical person he was rather than myth he became over the centuries; and (2) there is no reason we must take his authority over a reasoned human response to the great issues of our day.

Now that might not have been perfectly clear due to my edits, but it was my original intent.

Much on my mind was the religious/political milieu that we find ourselves in. It seems to be more of the rule rather than the exception to have politicians who invoke God for drought relief as well as debt relief and a host of other earthly problems.

Those on the right of the political spectrum listen for God's instructions about running for office or informing their administrative decisions. They believe our nation should return to its Puritan roots and feel that fighting against abortion, gay rights, promoting intelligent design creationism in the public school house, and urging the posting of the Decalogue all over government property are among the biggest issues we face.

On the other hand, those on the left, intent on casting Jesus in their own image, ask the question "What would Jesus Cut?" while declaring government budgets to be "moral documents." Jesus is also invoked as an authority on the question of the illegal alien problem. Jesus has become a liberal politician!

Through it all I ask: who speaks for Jesus? Can we do anything more than examine his life as it is represented in the most authoritative sources we have? He wasn't a believer in democracy, why drag him into our politics?

The history of what eventually became the United States is steeped in the Christian religion right from the original British invasion. However, I don't see that as an improvement over the Paganism that was here before. In fact, I would rather a see a return to that than a return to Puritanism.

But the best thing of all would be a dedication to a secular state that protects the religious and intellectual freedom of every citizen. Paganism is making something of a comeback. Christianity is continually being revised and modernized. Judaism remains a strong influence. Islam is being attacked by Christian supremacists, but is gaining numbers here and throughout the world. Atheism, while still much maligned, is slowly becoming more respectable. Religious eclecticists abound. And none of this religiosity should have any influence on our nation's great secular Constitution.

It's such a simple concept, why must it be so controversial?

Did Jesus Believe In The Universal Brotherhood Of Man?

Jesus can never be the symbol of a universal religion because he was a strict adherent of the Abrahamic faith - a faith which recognizes one people, the seed of Abraham, as God's chosen people. God's covenant with Abraham, as explained in the Bible, is as follows:

Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee:

And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing:

And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed (Genesis 12:1-3).

To understand the truth about Jesus is to understand that he did not believe in or preach the universal brotherhood of man.

Reverend Clare Woolston's words to the popular children's song Jesus Loves the Little Children

Jesus loves the little children,
All the children of the world.
Red and yellow, black and white,
All are precious in his sight,
Jesus loves the little children of the world

endearing as they are, do not quite capture the thought of the biblical Jesus, son of Abraham and of God.

Jesus directed his ministry to the restoration of Israel to her religious roots. Once Israel is restored and Jerusalem transformed, she would then be the center of God's truth on earth and channel of blessings to the nations and in that way would fulfill the portion of the covenant promising that "all the families of the earth" would be blessed through Abraham and his faith in the one, true God.

When a Canaannite woman came to Jesus beseeching him to pray for her ailing daughter, he at first rebuffed her with:

I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel ... It is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it to dogs (Matthew 15:24 & 26).

That truly is a hard saying, that non-Jews were "dogs." But Jesus was only one of a long line of religious teachers who proclaimed the Jews the chosen people and "light unto the nations":

For thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God, and the LORD hath chosen thee to be a peculiar people unto himself, above all the nations that are upon the earth (Deuteronomy 14:2).

In the book of Isaiah the prophet the times of Israel's restoration and renewal of Jerusalem are spoken of thusly:

For thus saith the LORD, Behold, I will extend peace to her like a river, and the glory of the Gentiles like a flowing stream: then shall ye suck, ye shall be borne upon her sides, and be dandled upon her knees (Isaiah 66:12).

Of course as a humanist I cannot accept such ideas. I embrace the basic equality of all peoples.

That isn't to say I necessarily think Jesus was a bad man, just a flawed man with a narrow outlook. I can't embrace his religious ideal nor accept him as great religious teacher. His words as we have them must be interpreted in the light of their historical setting. To do otherwise is to do violence to the truth.

Sunday Meditation: God Is Near, Not Far

From my earliest childhood I remember watching the night sky, imagining God somewhere beyond the stars looking down on me and watching over me - not the folks on the underside of our globe, mind you, but looking down on me and mine. I thought often about the day when I would "move" to Heaven to live with him.

But the God of my childhood seemed always so far away. "God is everywhere," I was told. Yet I never saw him. "He's got the world in his hands," we sung at my church - but I never heard his voice nor directly felt his presence. The closest I could seem to get was at night, gazing into space.

It took me many years to reprogram myself - to find God in my immediate surroundings rather than "beyond the blue" only. Leaving behind the Bible as God's word and revelation to mankind, I began to study my surroundings and find the true message there, and there alone. No, there and inside me.

For today's meditation I've selected a pregnant passage from one of my favorite nature writers, the incomparable John Burroughs. It was taken from his book Time and Change and helps to put things into what I believe is their proper perspective:

Man has from the earliest period believed himself of divine origin, and by the divine he has meant something far removed from this earth and all its laws and processes, something quite transcending the mundane forces. He has invented or dreamed myths and legends to throw the halo of the exceptional, the far removed, the mystical, or the divine around his origin.He has spurned the clod with his foot; he has denied all kinship with bird and beast around him, and looked to the heavens above for the sources of his life.

And then unpitying science comes along and tells him that he is under the same law as the life he treads under foot, and that that law is adequate to transform the worm into the man; that he, too, has groveled in the dust, or wallowed in the slime, or fought and reveled, a reptile among reptiles; that the heavens above him, to which he turns with such awe and reverence, or such dread and foreboding, are the source of his life and hope in no other sense than they are the source of the life and hope of all other creatures. But this is the way of science; it enhances the value or significance of everything about us that we are wont to treat as cheap or vulgar, and it discounts the value of the things far off upon which we have laid such stress. It ties us to the earth, it calls in the messengers we send forth into the unknown; it makes the astonishing revelation — revolutionary revelation, I may say — that the earth is embosomed in the infinite heavens the same as the stars that shine above us, that the creative energy is working now and here underfoot, the same as in the ages of myth and miracle; in other words, that God is really immanent in his universe, and inseparable from it; that we have been in heaven and under the celestial laws all our lives, and knew it not.

Science thus kills religion, poetry, and romance only so far as it dispels our illusions and brings us back from the imaginary to the common and the near at hand. It discounts heaven in favor of earth. It should make us more at home in the world, and more conscious of the daily beauty and wonders that surround us, and, if it does not, the trouble is probably in the ages of myth and fable that lie behind us and that have left their intoxicating influence in our blood.

Are You A Slave Or A Freeman?

I saw this in the The Florida Times-Union by reporter Jeff Brumley. It is a little item about the new Holman Christian Standard Bible, a new translation of the Bible dedicated to what it calls Optimal Equivalence. That's a good thing, I believe.

But no Bible translation is ever above criticism, and Brumley writes:

One of them is using the word "Messiah" instead of "Christ" when referring to Jesus in Jewish contexts. Why? Because the coming of the Messiah fulfilled ancient Jewish longings, a fact that many Christians don't hear at church. "Sometimes readers miss this, mistaking the title 'Christ' for Jesus' last name," according to an advertisement for the new translation.

It will also use the term "slaves" of Jesus instead of "servants," because the former better imparts the radical nature of discipleship, the publisher says.

Now that latter is good, if surprising, because I think most Christians would be shocked it they got down their Bibles, concordances, and Bible dictionaries and set out to really understand biblical words like servant, Lord, master, and redemption.

I've made the statement before and will now again that the Bible was written during an era that accepted slavery and even uses the terminology and concept of slavery to portray the relationship between man and God, as the Apostle Paul does in this well-known passage (among other places):

What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's (I Corinthians 6:19,20).

Jesus accepted slavery and also used the concept in his teaching ministry, and the gospels even tells us "the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many" (Matthew 20:28).

Wouldn't it have been a great thing had the Bible gone against the grain and condemned the popular and accepted practice of human enslavement as a stench in the nostrils of God?

This to me just another evidence that the Bible was the product of man, and at that men who were usurpers

I cannot help but object.

And The Prayer Of Faith Shall Balance The Budget

Harrisburg, Pennsylvania Mayor Linda Thompson has been making headlines recently because of her Christian faith. Well, actually, it is because she is taking part in a three day prayer and fasting ritual designed to persuade the Almighty to help the city overcome its crushing financial crisis.

In this CNBC story we find her admitting:

“Things that are above and beyond my control, I need God,” Thompson told WHTM TV, the region’s ABC news affiliate. “I depend on Him for guidance. Spiritual guidance. That’s why it’s really no struggle for me to join this fast and prayer.”

While this might strike some folks as strange, as a follower of Jesus Mayor Thompson stands well within the tradition of her religion:

When they came to the crowd, a man approached Jesus and knelt before him. Lord, have mercy on my son,” he said. “He has seizures and is suffering greatly. He often falls into the fire or into the water. I brought him to your disciples, but they could not heal him.”

“You unbelieving and perverse generation,” Jesus replied, “how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy here to me.” Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of the boy, and he was healed at that moment.

Then the disciples came to Jesus in private and asked, “Why couldn’t we drive it out?”

He replied, “Because you have so little faith. 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 17:14-21, NIV).

How's that again?

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” (emphasis mine).

For the life of me I don't understand how the prayer and fasting of Mayor Thompson and many of Harrisburg's citizens is going to change a thing, Jesus notwithstanding. I believe their crisis is purely of human origins and the final solution will be as well.

Too many politicians in both major parties (Thompson is a Democrat) are wearing their religion on their sleeves these days. If there faith is so strong, why must they make it such a public spectacle?

In the case of Thompson, this Christian Post item details some of the controversy her "in your face" faith has created.

Many times here at my blog I have been critical of the "people of faith" and the special deference they are accorded in our nation. Let me make clear: I do embrace and, if you will, hold sacred the idea of freedom of religion and all the other First Amendment protections. However, when religious folks want to be involved in the real world, the secular world, where we are all fellow citizens of a human creation (our great nation), they must learn to keep their civil duties separate from their religious duties.

To be clear, I have no problem whatsoever with our leaders praying, fasting, and practicing their religion in general. But I am greatly troubled when these matters are made public issues and used to stir needless controversy.

What Are You Taking With You To The Afterlife?

The following story has been all over my local news this week, occurring as it did just up the road in my old hometown of Chattanooga, Tennessee.

A local veteran died earlier this month and was buried in our National Cemetery. Later it was discovered that he took with him to his grave a set of dentures that belonged to his roommate during his last hospital stay. The hospital has admitted full responsibility for the mistake and is footing all the costs for an exhumation to retrieve the misplaced article and attorney's fees. An apology was issued to the families of both men. And the hospital now says they will pay for a new set of dentures for the man who lost his - however, the exhumation is still scheduled to proceed in order to remove the foreign object from the decedent's casket. This request, this morning's news is reporting, comes from the family of the deceased.

An odd little story to be sure and one that hopefully doesn't occur often.

Now in case you are wondering, the false teeth weren't placed in the corpse's mouth but were instead placed in a small box alongside other unspecified personal effects. That, rather than this unfortunate mix-up, is what got me thinking about the subject of this post.

I am truly fascinated by human burial customs. I've mentioned it before here on my blog, but will again that I want no part of any of it. I have chosen to be cremated, am yet undecided about what I will have done with my cremains. I'm looking into to having them scattered someplace. I respect the feelings of those who are traditionalists on the matter and prefer burial, but that just isn't who I am. I hate funerals and find them boring and unnecessarily gut-wrenching. This is just my personal opinion, but I believe life is for the living. I believe when you are dead you are dead. That is what death is, after all, the cessation of life. I have left orders that there not be a funeral conducted for me (in the event my mother survives me, however, I have reluctantly okayed a funeral out of respect for her desires). I believe the best way to honor a deceased loved one is by keeping alive their memory for as long as you live. And I want and expect my friends and loved ones to get on with their lives. There is an old poem I love and which speaks to my feelings about this matter:

When I am dead
Cry for me a little
Think of me sometimes
But not too much.
Think of me now and again
As I was in life
At some moments it's pleasant to recall
But not for long
Leave me in peace
And I shall leave you in peace
And while you live
Let your thoughts be with the living

On the other hand, I was watching a documentary this past weekend about ancient Egypt. Of course there was much about the Pyramids and this people's contributions to the art of embalming. I was fascinated by the descriptions of the process and of their burial customs. The wealthy were carefully embalmed and then placed in tombs along with personal items that would make their journey to and in the future life pleasurable. Things such as clothes, money, furniture, even food was placed in these tombs for future use. But I chuckled when in describing the embalming process, it was explained that the brain was carefully removed from the skull, and other organs - apart from the heart! - were removed before the corpse was stuffed and dried out. Like most of the ancients, the Egyptians thought of the heart as the seat of our emotions and intelligence. To me it seemed likely you would need your organs as much, if not more, than you would need food or spending cash if the future life was the way they envisioned it.

But before we laugh too hard at that, it is thought-provoking to note the things we often place on a dead loved one or inside their casket: eyeglasses that will never be read through, jewelry they will never show off, personal notes that will never be read, personal effects that can just have no meaning any longer to the person whose remains we are burying. This is a little puzzling.

My maternal grandfather was a Baptist preacher in his younger days. Something, I'm not sure what, happened somewhere along the way and in his later years he was not outwardly religious in any sense of the word and didn't attend church. Yet he left strict orders that he be buried in his long johns (underneath his suit, of course), because "I don't want to stand before my maker naked." His belief in the resurrection remained intact. (I can't imagine his logic in thinking his underwear would outlast his suit.)

Coming as I did from the Christian religion, I was steeped in the belief about a resurrection from the dead. A day at the end of time in which graves would be opened, corpses reanimated, loved ones reunited with their deceased. Oh, and those who had been lost at sea and devoured by the fishes and those who had been incinerated in fires would be reconstructed, too. Pretty amazing stuff, you have to admit.

I think the ghost-in-the-machine idea of the soul escaping from the body at death has become extremely popular, even among Christians who now seem to think of the resurrection as an afterthought. If one can survive and get along quite well without a body, why is a resurrection even necessary?

The more I ponder these things - and fully recognizing how unpleasant a subject death is for most people - the more I suspect our fears and abhorrence of death has led us to engage in an adult game of Just Pretend.

I don't like death. The pain of losing friends and loved ones to death is as difficult and unpleasant for me as it is with anyone. I don't like the idea that one day I will cease to exist. But I've tried to make peace with death. It's a part of life's cycle and must be accepted as such. To my way of thinking, evading the truth of cessation of life is just denial.

Of course I realize I'm in the minority with that view. (But then I'm in the minority concerning a lot of things.)

The Just So Serpent

A friend of mine here in North Georgia sent this picture to me yesterday. It's a picture a friend had sent her of a snake they had found (and eliminated) on their property. Boy, it's a whopper! (Click the picture for a larger view.) I thought my readers might get a kick out of it, and of course it made me think of the story of the serpent that caused the fall of man.

That story is what Rudyard Kipling would have called a Just So story, which is meant to explain how things came to be or were altered from their original state of being. It is mythology.

The early chapters of Genesis are myths that explain why things are the way they are and how they came to be so. Why do we die rather than live forever? Why do men have to toil to make a living? Why do women have to obey their husbands (well, I suppose that's a throwback to the "good old days")? Why do women suffer so when they have children (another throwback - modern medicine has done much to overcome this curse and thwart God's plan)? Want to know why there are rainbows? That also is explained in the opening chapters of Genesis?

Nice little stories that no doubt fascinated young and old alike in those relatively carefree days of scientific ignorance.

Then there is the story of how the serpent tempted our mythical first parents into disobeying God. How God altered the serpent by removing his ability to walk, cursing him to slither on his belly for the rest of history. How the enmity between humans and snakes came about:

Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said to the woman, “Has God indeed said, ‘You shall not eat of every tree of the garden’?”

And the woman said to the serpent, “We may eat the fruit of the trees of the garden; but of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat it, nor shall you touch it, lest you die.’”

Then the serpent said to the woman, “You will not surely die. For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings.

And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden.

Then the LORD God called to Adam and said to him, “Where are you?” So he said, “I heard Your voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid myself.” And He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you that you should not eat?” Then the man said, “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate.” And the LORD God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”

So the LORD God said to the serpent:
“ Because you have done this,
You are cursed more than all cattle,
And more than every beast of the field;
On your belly you shall go,
And you shall eat dust
All the days of your life.
And I will put enmity
Between you and the woman,
And between your seed and her Seed;
He shall bruise your head,
And you shall bruise His heel.”


To the woman He said:
“I will greatly multiply your sorrow and your conception;
In pain you shall bring forth children;
Your desire shall be for your husband,
And he shall rule over you.”


Then to Adam He said, “Because you have heeded the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree of which I commanded you, saying, ‘You shall not eat of it’:
“ Cursed is the ground for your sake;
In toil you shall eat of it
All the days of your life.

Both thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you,
And you shall eat the herb of the field.

In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread
Till you return to the ground,
For out of it you were taken;
For dust you are,
And to dust you shall return.”

And Adam called his wife’s name Eve, because she was the mother of all living. Also for Adam and his wife the LORD God made tunics of skin, and clothed them (Genesis 3:1-21).

Well, bless my soul! It looks as if I just stumbled upon the origin of our tradition of wearing clothes. Since I don't do nearly enough to promote good old-fashioned nudity here on my blog, I'm including this illustration of the story. There is a problem though. The snake appears in his cursed state, even though he is obviously in the act of enticing Adam and Eve. Oh well, the view is still a good one, I think. I meant of the snake, who looks very like the one in the photo my friend sent me. Don't you guys think?

Mythology is fun and was intended to be enjoyable. I really feel that when the Bible is read with an eye towards these details - instead of the way I was raised to read it, with literalistic fundamentalist eyes - the richness of the human experience literally leaps from its pages. Sure, the Bible is intended as history. But it is religious history, which employs myth to get across its deeper meaning.

Another interesting thing to note. The devil is not originally mentioned in connection with the serpent in this story. That came later when theologians infused this myth with still a different meaning. Never let it be said that the religious mind is an idle one.

Another Look At The Great Commission

My blogging friend Don Rogers, of the always interesting Reflections blog which I love to read, left a comment on yesterday's post that got me to thinking about what has become known as The Great Commission. Does it mean what most Christians think it means? Does it contradict the theory I advance, that Jesus was an apocalyptic preacher who was preaching the soon coming end of the world and establishment of God's kingdom on earth, by calling for a centuries-long mission to carry the gospel to every individual on the planet?

As that commission is usually understood, Christians allegedly have a responsibility to carry the gospel of Jesus Christ to all the nations of the world, and in effect go to these people and say (when all is said and done and faux-diplomacy is laid aside for what it is): "Look folks, your traditional belief system, the religion of your fathers and your father's fathers is not only totally wrong, but will carry your immortal souls to a place called Hell, wherein you will punished for all eternity for not believing the truth you are hearing from us; there is no other way to Heaven but our way, no other savior upon which to rely for salvation except ours, period."

Nice message, isn't it? And I'm sure one that is appreciated by every Christian in this land when they hear something similar coming from foreign missionaries of other religions who come here to set the record straight (as they understand the matter).

First let me get these passages which teach The Great Commission on here in order to look a bit more closely at them.

I will start with what the version contained in Matthew's gospel:

And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matt. 28:18-20, New American Standard Bible).

Now in case you are wondering why I didn't start with what most Bible scholars feel is the oldest gospel, the Gospel According to Mark, well, honestly, according to the oldest manuscripts, Mark doesn't record this commission. Originally that gospel ended at chapter 16 verse 8, when the ladies had found Jesus' tomb empty and a "young man" informed them that they should go tell his disciples about it, and: They went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had gripped them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid (verse 8 NASB).

Not a very good ending for a gospel. A definite down note, with much uncertainty. But not to worry, later hands added on to this account, and in bringing it more into line with the other gospels, included the following version of the Great Commission found in later manuscripts:

And He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. He who has believed and has been baptized shall be saved; but he who has disbelieved shall be condemned. These signs will accompany those who have believed: in My name they will cast out demons, they will speak with new tongues; they will pick up serpents, and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover.”

So then, when the Lord Jesus had spoken to them, He was received up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God. And they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them, and confirmed the word by the signs that followed (Mark 16; 15-20. NASB).

(Uh-oh. There's that snake handling thingy I posted about a few weeks ago!)

Lastly, we'll go to Luke's gospel for his account:

Then He opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, and He said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Christ would suffer and rise again from the dead the third day, and that repentance for forgiveness of sins would be proclaimed in His name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. And behold, I am sending forth the promise of My Father upon you; but you are to stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high” (Luke 24: 45-49, NASB).

Wow! Again we are faced with the question: What exactly did Jesus say? Do these sayings really represent an actual teaching of Jesus, or were they added later by his followers as a logic for carrying on the mission of their teacher?

Well, again, I point out that the oldest gospel didn't have Jesus issuing such a commission, ending instead with his resurrection from the dead. It was later added, and with a version more spectacular than the others.

My opinion on this is that Jesus likely did say something about his disciples going on with the good news of the coming kingdom in the probable event of his death (there can be little doubt that he was always treading on dangerous ground with his kingdom preaching, appearing as one leading a potential insurrection against the Roman government). I believe this commission idea was probably part of Jesus' earlier sayings and was relayed out of place as a post-resurrection command as his followers were trying to come to grips with the meaning of the death of their leader.

However, a question I first want to emphasize is this: [Granting for the sake of argument that Jesus did say something roughly similar to what Matthew and Luke record] To whom was Jesus speaking? Christians of today? Every Christian who would follow along later?

No. Clearly he was speaking to his disciples, and it was they who were tasked with carrying on the mission he started but died before completing.

And the many well-meaning missionaries down through the centuries who have been tortured and killed and endured incredible hardship and loss of health in the carrying of the gospel to all parts of the globe did so under a false premise. They might all just as well have first gone to Jerusalem and stayed there until they were "clothed with power from on high" (complete with tongues of fire and speaking in foreign languages they did not know as in the book of Acts, where we find the fulfillment of Jesus' instructions here) before starting their missions, for that was a part of the Commission as well - that they go to Jerusalem and wait.

What I'm suggesting is that the so-called Great Commission is just as dated and just as much a historical matter as is Jesus' original gospel that the time was fulfilled and the kingdom of God was at hand (Mark 1:15). It is in the book Acts that we find the disciples waiting for the promised outpouring of the Holy Spirit and the beginning of their efforts to carry on with Jesus' mission.

The problem is, people tend to read the New Testament with modern eyes, as having a direct relation to our times. The truth is, Jesus never envisioned a centuries long "church age." When his message is taken at face value, his message was geared to an event that he thought was "in the air" and taking shape in his day and age.

When people read "go into all the world" they naturally assume this means all the developed countries in our day. The disciples, in that age of limited knowledge of the vastness of the planet and limited means of travel, could hardly have entertained the thought of being globetrotters.

Understanding that point, the matter of the Great Commission ties in perfectly with Jesus' prediction that all these things, the fulfillment of the great tribulation, the fall of Jerusalem and destruction of the holy temple, the end of the age, and the establishment of God's kingdom would occur during the lifetimes of these commissioned disciples.

To get the true perspective of this, we should turn to Mark chapter 13, which is the earliest version we have of Jesus' great discourse in answer to his disciples question "when will these things be [the complete destruction of Jerusalem' temple which he had just predicted], and what will be the sign when all these things are going to be fulfilled?"

While I won't take the space to give Jesus' entire answer to their question, I hope my readers will turn to that passage and read it and notice especially verse 10, were he said: "The gospel must first be preached to all the nations."

Remember that the upper limit for the fulfillment of all the things Jesus here predicts is the lifetime of that first generation of his disciples:

Even so, you too, when you see these things happening, recognize that He is near, right at the door. Truly I say to you, this generation will not pass away until all these things take place (Mark 13:29, 30, NASB).

The conclusion, then, is inescapable that whatever Jesus meant by the gospel having to be preached in "all the nations," it was something he deemed both necessary and doable in the first century A. D. And it also follows that the common popular interpretation of the Great Commission is dead wrong.

It so happens that the book of the Acts of the Apostles, a sequel to Luke's gospel and apparently written by the same author, sheds further light on how Jesus' commission to his disciples was understood. Chapter 1 of that book has the disciples waiting as directed in Jerusalem.

During this period we are told that the resurrected Jesus appears to his disciples, who asked him: "Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom to Israel?” This, of course, is the kingdom that the Old Testament prophets had predicted and that Jesus had preached during his ministry. And we are told that Jesus responded as follows:

“It is not for you to know times or epochs which the Father has fixed by His own authority; but you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the remotest part of the earth” (verse 7).

Again, even the qualifier "the remotest part of the earth" must be understood in the context of what was known in the first century. As large as that sounds, it still had a limited scope in comparison to what we know of the planet in our day. In that same book of Acts, chapter 2, we are told that when the promise of the Holy Spirit was fulfilled to the disciples on the day of Pentecost "there were Jews living in Jerusalem, devout men from every nation under heaven" (Acts 2:5). I must insist that Jesus' commission to his disciples was something Jesus expected would be fulfilled in their lifetime.

Now notice something else. Assuming as the majority do that Jesus' discourses were spoken in approximately A.D. 33, we notice that another of his followers, the Apostle Paul, who also followed the tradition of predicting an imminent apocalypse, wrote to the Christians in Colossae that the gospel had been preached in all the world in their day, some three or so decades after Jesus' death:

And although you were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds, yet He has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach—if indeed you continue in the faith firmly established and steadfast, and not moved away from the hope of the gospel that you have heard, WHICH WAS PROCLAIMED IN ALL CREATION UNDER HEAVEN [emphasis mine], and of which I, Paul, was made a minister (Colossians 1:21-23, circa A.D. 60, NASB).

So in summary:

The church today can in no way be fulfilling the Great Commission of Jesus because

(a) it was a commission given only to his disciples,
(b) found fulfillment beginning on the day of Pentecost,
(c) had been fulfilled during the first century as stated by the Apostle Paul,
(d) and was specifically stated by Jesus to be accomplished within the lifetime of the disciples, during which the age was to have ended and the Kingdom of God established on earth.

My position is that the understanding of Jesus as an apocalyptic preacher and prophet is the only view that does justice to his teachings as we have them in the canonical gospels, the earliest credible sources we have, without deleting huge portions of not only what Jesus had to say about the end of the age and the kingdom, but the majority of the rest of the New Testament (which was written from the perspective of being in the "last days" and "last times").

The fiction that Jesus came to establish a new religion that was to last centuries into the future is just that.

The Christians of our day are not followers of the gospel of Jesus. They couldn't be, because the prophecies of that gospel went unfulfilled with the death of his disciples and so are null and void, but instead are followers of a mythology created by the Roman Catholic Church, which created Orthodox Christianity and held the great church councils that established the Christian Bible and decided matters relating to the proper (according to their view) understanding of the person of Jesus. The Catholic Church has also wielded great political power throughout the centuries.

And the Protestant Christians (even the Baptists who claim not be Protestants but the original church of Jesus) are really renegades from the Mother Church who have ditched the tradition and authority of the Mother Church - yet retain their orthodoxy - in favor of something they call Sola Scriptura, the idea that the Bible alone contains all the necessary religious truth.

Did Jesus Really Say Everything He Said?

Of course I got the idea for the post title from Yogi Berra's book of "Yogisms," The Yogi Book: I Really Didn't Say Everything I Said. Often things which sound like something Yogi would have said are falsely attributed to him. This book, I suppose, sort of sets the record straight.

I wish it were that easy for the sayings of Jesus of Nazareth.

Inevitably whenever I write a post about some of the more controversial things Jesus said, someone will point out the possibility that some of these things might not be authentic.

On that point I am always ready to concede.

Scholars - the Jesus Seminar being a recent and good example - have debated these matters for some time now and no consensus exists about which sayings of Jesus are authentic and which aren't. I think it isn't possible to form one. It is practically impossible to separate one's preconceived view of Jesus from the larger discussion. That colors what we think Jesus might or might not have said.

None of this is a problem for fundamentalists. They believe every word of the Bible, down to the last jot and tittle, is inspired of God, literally God-breathed. (What is a problem in need of a good explanation is why the various gospel writers, all supposedly under God's inspirational direction, often quote Jesus using different words and phrasing!)

The matter of what Jesus actually did teach would have been made much easier for us had Jesus simply wrote it all down. The reason he did not do this can well be explained, I believe, with my pet theory: Jesus was an itinerant Jewish apocalyptic preacher who taught the end was "at hand." Inasmuch as he thought that present dispensation would soon be coming to an end, it wouldn't have made sense to leave a written record because the fullness of the Kingdom of God of which he preached was soon to be spread across the whole earth.

My own approach has been to take Jesus as a literal, historical character, and the synoptic gospels as the earliest and best accounts of his life. There are throughout these works some very suspicious possible additions and likely spurious matters (such as the fuller ending of Mark's gospel, which doesn't seem to have been in the original, for example). And it seems to me also that many Old Testament Scripture passages are used rather freely, as if in an effort to fill in blanks in Jesus' life. Some of the examples used to make Jesus the apparent object of certain Old Testament prophets also seem quite contrived. And the gospel of John contains ideas that seem to come from a later period of Christological development, and that makes the book less than useful as biographical material. At least that is my opinion.

Perhaps this issue would not be such a big deal if so many millions of people did not believe that Jesus and what he had to say is extremely relevant to us today. If my thesis of Jesus as an apocalyptic preacher is even approaching the truth, it seems we are justified in treating the historical Jesus the way we treat other ancient characters of renown. They are fascinating subjects to study, some of their ideas may be helpful in a philosophical way, but in no way must we submit wholeheartedly to their ideas as presenting divine counsel for how to live.

From his sensational birth accounts to the fantastical and confused details of what supposedly happened to him after his death, and with the details of his life sandwiched in between as muddled as a familiar song played on an out of tune piano, (oh yes, then there are those largely silent pre-ministry years, too) Jesus' life story presents us with an enigma. But it is stuff of legend.

Or perhaps it is better said that Jesus' life story as his followers told it is the stuff of mythology. For once we have placed him in his proper historical setting, then the richness of the Jesus myth as contained in John's gospel and the Gnostic tradition, in Paul's mystery religion can be profitably explored. It isn't so much the life of Jesus that has been significant these many years, it is mythology built upon that life that made and keeps Jesus relevant to many.

So, in a manner of speaking, did Jesus really say everything he said. No. But that doesn't matter from a religious or spiritual perspective. Mythological truth is totally different from pragmatic truth. Religious fundamentalists are blind to that and interpret myth literally. That is why religious fundamentalism tends to produce kooks and outsiders from the mainstream.

Sunday Meditation: The Creed Of Kindly Eyes

How shall we live in this world of toil and turmoil? Is this a good creation that became cursed, and thus a vale of suffering and evil, because of the sin of our first parents? Should our spiritual ideals be framed around the idea of restoring fellowship with some estranged creator? Or are we all made of the same atoms and same flesh, and owe a debt of kindness and respect to each other?

Today's meditation is an old poem by Joseph Dana Miller, which suggests the simplest of creeds for making our world more tolerable. The illustration is Vincent Van Gogh's take on Jesus' parable of The Good Samaritan.

The Creed Of Kindly Eyes

How little smiles and words and deeds
Outweigh your subtly-fashioned creeds!
I think of them, and then of these—
The wondrous world-theologies;


The tales of anger and the fear
Of doctrines, vengeful or austere.
The gentle creed of kindly eyes
Is not, it may be, half so wise,


Or learned in the lore that's hid
With those that built the Pyramid.
When it was born no strength it took
From ritual, symbol, cross, or book;


And yet I doubt not with it fell
Some far sublimer miracle.
A creed that never laid a stick
On pyre for a heretic!


Its scroll with martyr's blood unwet,
It never damned an infant yet.
Edwards and Calvin, by your leave,
This is the creed that I'll believe—
The creed for children and the wise:
The gentle creed of kindly eyes!

The God Who Speaks

That was who my family worshipped as I was growing up. It was who I was taught from my earliest days to worship. It was the God the church I was reared in and grounded in the finer points of conservative Christian theology in upheld.

It was a common occurrence at my church to hear the adults speak of receiving messages from God, of having God invade their dreams, or show them signs.

And why not? The Bible is filled with example after example of God doing just these things.

My mother had many dreams, visions, and a few instances of God having audibly spoken to her down through the years - and she believes all that to this day. It is proof of the highest sort to her that God does exist, just as surely as you and I exist.

As a young child in the Primary Bible Class at our church, I was taught the story of Eli and Samuel, and it was repeated in our home many, many times. I expected and was encouraged to expect that God would one day speak to me. This story provided the template of how I should act when that time came.

And the child Samuel ministered unto the LORD before Eli. And the word of the LORD was precious in those days; there was no open vision.

And it came to pass at that time, when Eli was laid down in his place, and his eyes began to wax dim, that he could not see;

And ere the lamp of God went out in the temple of the LORD, where the ark of God was, and Samuel was laid down to sleep;

That the LORD called Samuel: and he answered, Here am I.

And he ran unto Eli, and said, Here am I; for thou calledst me. And he said, I called not; lie down again. And he went and lay down.

And the LORD called yet again, Samuel. And Samuel arose and went to Eli, and said, Here am I; for thou didst call me. And he answered, I called not, my son; lie down again.

Now Samuel did not yet know the LORD, neither was the word of the LORD yet revealed unto him.

And the LORD called Samuel again the third time. And he arose and went to Eli, and said, Here am I; for thou didst call me. And Eli perceived that the LORD had called the child.

Therefore Eli said unto Samuel, Go, lie down: and it shall be, if he call thee, that thou shalt say, Speak, LORD; for thy servant heareth. So Samuel went and lay down in his place.

And the LORD came, and stood, and called as at other times, Samuel, Samuel. Then Samuel answered, Speak; for thy servant heareth (1 Samuel 31-10, KJV).

It seems funny now, but I remember how as I got older and my faith began to slip away from me in the wake of my learning how to think critically about my religious belief system, I prayed repeatedly for God to speak to me, to show me the truth, to prove his existence to me. I did that off and on for years. I had hoped for an experience like Samuel had, never received it, and ached when I came to the realization is was all just another fairy tell - one I had amazingly held on to until my adult years.

It wasn't a straight line or sudden conversion, my leaving theism for the non-theistic worldview. I left the highly emotionally charged Pentecostal faith, that the older I got seemed sillier and farther removed from reality than I was able to see as a child. I drifted to the Baptists and then later to the Churches of Christ, looking for something less sensational and more logically situated. Finding those attempts unsatisfactorily, I found solace for a while in the deism of Thomas Paine. But finding more answers to my earnest questions in the sciences, I found pantheism a better fit for me in the end.

As humans have probed more deeply into the mysteries of the mind, I feel we have opened new vistas for understanding such things as auditory hallucinations (which I myself suffer from, but don't mistake for God's voice). the waking dreams or visual hallucinations that are "divine visions," and the altered states of consciousness that are understood by many to be religious ecstasy and experiences of the divine.

So, yes, I think religion is all in the head, or in our minds. That doesn't mean I dismiss religion as an insignificant aberration of human behavior. It seems to me to be tied in with that great conundrum of human consciousness, the illusion that we are somehow separate from the seamless garment of nature, that the "real" us is a "ghost in the machine."

Rather than unnecessarily multiplying entities in that way, I believe we should examine more carefully what we do know and have access to, or as British philosopher Bertrand Russell once put it: "Whenever possible, substitute constructions out of known entities for inferences to unknown entities."

This has made the study of religion an easier task for me.

Harold Camping A Victim Of God's Smiting?

The news is now out that disgraced prophet Harold Camping suffered a brain stroke last week that impaired his ability to speak clearly.

Despite the fact that he is almost ninety years old and well past the biblical threescore and ten years of man (Psalms 90:10), and beyond that strokes are common among the elderly, a hot topic among Christians is whether Camping's stroke is merely a coincidence or God's punishment on a false prophet. I'm reading about it in this item from The Christian Post. They have the whole story, complete with a conservative theologian's take on the matter, Biola University's Erik Thoennes, who offers:

"When we read the Bible, it is clear that God is active in creation. He takes sin seriously, he judges sin, he punishes individuals and people groups and nations and churches," said Thoennes. "All the time you have God revealing himself and working out His redemptive purposes for creation ... To speculate with some sort of certainty that we know what’s going on when someone has a stroke is not something we’re able to do because the Bible doesn’t give us the interpretation for it," continued Thoennes.

"That’s not to say it can’t be helpful for us to ask: Lord, are you up to something here? Lord, are you trying to teach me something? That may be the case but it’s very hard to know with certainty ... Sometimes we rush to connect the dots but sometimes we can’t know why they (calamities) happened."

It makes me sad in this twenty-first century to see an educated and supposedly intelligent man speaking in this manner and to read that it is a hot topic of debate on Twitter and Facebook, as the above linked article states.

Surely the real story is how foolish, ignorant, and downright superstitious the masses allow themselves to be despite the vast sums we spend on public education and public libraries.

But what this does tell us is how Christians think. And it is hard to resist the temptation of saying they really are just revealing how they would act if they were God.

Kingdom Coming: Get Rid Of Your Wealth

When I was a teenager and still a Christian, I began to study my Bible earnestly for myself. My starting place was the gospels, for it was there that the life of that man Jesus, the man whom for years I considered my savior, the man whose death on the cross for my sins fascinated me so that I kept a picture of him (actually, an actor portraying him) wearily carrying his cross up Golgotha's hill, the man whose pithy little tidbits of wisdom had been quoted to me so often I knew a great many of them by heart.

And then I began noticing some of his less popular teachings. I have written posts on some of these things before. Today I am going to concentrate on Jesus teachings concerning his disdain for wealth. I began to find some of his doctrines impractical if not outright impossible to obey, and his teachings about money is certainly one of those.

Listening to my Christian friends duck and dodge in order to avoid the plain meaning of Jesus' words is both humorous to me and a little sad. Because, like the rich young ruler we are going to meet in just a moment, when the truth of Jesus' ideal are pressed hard upon them, they go away crestfallen - or just plain angry at me for bringing the subject up.

His basic teaching on this matter is laid out in his Sermon on the Mount:

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also ... No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth. (Matthew 6:19-21 & 24, American Standard Version).

If plain words have any meaning at all, there can be no other way to understand this than to accept that Jesus taught a disregard for the material things of this world. The lifestyle of the average American, for example, the majority of whom claim to be followers of Jesus, is totally at odds with what Jesus plainly taught.

Jesus continued his discourse:

For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they? And who of you by being worried can add a single hour to his life? And why are you worried about clothing? Observe how the lilies of the field grow; they do not toil nor do they spin, yet I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, will He not much more clothe you? You of little faith! Do not worry then, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear for clothing?’ For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you (Matthew 6:25-33).

And here I invite all my Christian friends to just try that. Try to find your food the way birds do. The heavenly Father feeds them. The trees are full of berries, the ground is rich with worms, insects are plentiful. And as for dress, the lilies are clothed by nature - and if we tried that one any place but the nude beaches or resorts, we would risk jail.

Like most folks, and unlike the lilies of the field, I do toil in order to have food to eat and clothes to wear. And Gentile that I am, I do save and put effort into having some reasonable standard of living (I am very into the voluntary simplicity lifestyle, but that is another post). I do the very opposite of what Jesus preaches - just as do the Christians who try to convert me.

Okay, some will say, obviously Jesus and his followers wore clothes, so he must have been speaking a little less than absolutely literally here. And to that I can agree. Jesus ate "real" food that had been prepared (and no doubt purchased, although the grounding of wheat grown in the field and catching of fish by individuals was common) by others.

But how figuratively can you take Jesus' warnings about accumulating wealth and still remain true to what he said?

Now let us examine the story of The Rich Young Ruler:

And someone came to Him and said, “Teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may obtain eternal life?” And He said to him, “Why are you asking Me about what is good? There is only One who is good; but if you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments.” Then he *said to Him, “Which ones?” And Jesus said, “YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT MURDER; YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY; YOU SHALL NOT STEAL; YOU SHALL NOT BEAR FALSE WITNESS; HONOR YOUR FATHER AND MOTHER; and YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.” The young man *said to Him, “All these things I have kept; what am I still lacking?” Jesus said to him, “If you wish to be complete, go and sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.” But when the young man heard this statement, he went away grieving; for he was one who owned much property (Matthew 19:16-22).

And then we need to look at Jesus assessment of this incident:

And Jesus said to His disciples, “Truly I say to you, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” When the disciples heard this, they were very astonished and said, Then who can be saved?” And looking at them Jesus said to them, “With people this is impossible, but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:23-26).

It is hard for a rich man to enter heaven because in order to do so he must divest himself of his wealth. And that type of faith in God can only come from God, according to Jesus.

Again, Jesus commanded his followers:

Sell your possessions and give to charity; make yourselves money belts which do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near nor moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also (Luke 12:33,34).

It easy here to think of the wealthy in terms of Donald Trump, Bill Gates, or perhaps the incredibly wealthy prosperity preachers who pollute the airways. Solomon, and his great wealth, was mentioned by Jesus in the passages above. But Jesus is clearly condemning the accumulation of common wealth (money, property) as a hindrance to the pursuit of God's kingdom. This at first is a bit confusing considering that in the Old Testament riches were seen as the blessing of God.

These things troubled my young mind as I read them and pondered the meaning. No Christians I knew, including my own impoverished but Christian family, lived the way Jesus did, without concern for earthly treasure and committed 24/7 to announcing the coming kingdom of God.

I have written much on the historical Jesus here on my blog. These writings are the fruit of my attempts to understand Jesus in his proper historical context. The earliest account we have of Jesus' ministry, the Gospel of Mark, starts with the mission of Jesus:

Now after John had been taken into custody, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God, and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel” (Mark 1:14,15).

As I studied the gospels I began to see that Jesus did not set out to start a new religion. The popular image of Jesus as a kindly and wise religious teacher, going about spouting godly aphorisms and advice about how to live here on earth is totally wrong.

No, Jesus was a Jewish teacher who, being steeped in the apocalyptic writings of his religion, was a herald of what he thought was the soon coming kingdom of God. The time was fulfilled and the kingdom was at hand!

Jesus' personal disregard for riches and admonishments for others to follow his lead make perfect sense in that context.

If the kingdom of God was about to burst forth upon the earth, such things would not matter. Those who accepted Jesus' message were expected to leave everything behind and prepare for the new order. The scales of justice would soon be balanced, the poor would finally be comforted, the slaves freed, the rich humbled, and it only made sense for the pious to get started immediately by selling what they had and giving it to the poor.

Those who followed Jesus to the letter were no doubt grievously disappointed when the oppressive Roman Empire was not finally overthrown by the establishment of God's kingdom. Those who follow the apocalypticists always are disappointed.

Now I have no reason at all to doubt Jesus' sincerity. Rebellion was in the air in his day, and the Jewish people were ready for deliverance. Their sacred writings reflected that desire for and promise of deliverance from their enemies, from their God's enemies. Certain passages in the book of Daniel, especially chapter two, seemed to indicate that the Roman empire was the last kingdom in line before the arrival of God's kingdom. Obviously that interpretation proved false. But there is no reason to think of Jesus as anything other than a sincere, but obviously mistaken, zealot.

What grew out of his splinter division in Judaism is what we now know as orthodox Christianity - a religion more about Jesus than what Jesus' gospel actually was. His kingdom message was "spiritualized" and interpreted figuratively, or understood to have been postponed because of the great unbelief of the original audience.

But for those who believe the kingdom is still imminent and that Jesus could "return at any moment, even today!" the teaching concerning wealth that Jesus left are troubling. Modern day Christians have no recourse but to either ignore their master's clear teachings or distort them to a point of total irrelevance. However, their lifestyles clearly contradict their alleged belief in the gospel Jesus preached.

The Apostle Paul: Man Of Science?

Who would have thought that the man who according to tradition wrote the majority of the New Testament after receiving a divine vision of the risen Jesus was also a staunch proponent of the scientific method?

This is what one Lutheran minister would have us believe, as laid out in his recent letter-to-the-editor. Read his entire letter here.

Rev. Jensen's rebuttal letter contains the following bit of tortured logic:

Regarding the June 6 letter, "Time to vanquish fear-mongering": The writer is utterly mistaken in his assertion that "knowledge of the basic earth sciences" is considered "forbidden fruit" in the Bible. To the contrary, Holy Scripture (Romans 1:18-20) urges humans to take serious heed to our knowledge of nature in light of what we now call the scientific method.

Let's look at those verses as translated in the New International Version Bible:

The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.

Pardon me, Rev. Jensen, isn't that circular reasoning instead of scientific reasoning? God's "invisible qualities" are revealed by his creation. In other words, "look folks, here is this amazing cosmos, obviously 'made' by God."

No doubt Paul the Jew, who was "thoroughly trained in the law of our fathers" at the feet of the great Jewish teacher Gamaliel (Acts 22:3), had in his mind when he wrote the words quoted by Jensen the verse from the Psalmist: "The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands" (Psalms 19:1).

In truth, Paul, Rev. Jensen, and Christian apologists all begin with the assumption of what they intend to prove (a personal creator God is back of the universe and man) and argue from that.

On the other hand, the scientific method is explained in the Merriam-Webster dictionary as the

principles and procedures for the systematic pursuit of knowledge involving the recognition and formulation of a problem, the collection of data through observation and experiment, and the formulation and testing of hypotheses.

Without doubt Paul was a theologian, not a scientist.

Why Pantheism Instead Of Atheism?

Inasmuch as I don't hold a belief in a person deity, which is what theism implies, it is fair to call me an atheist and understand that my worldview is atheistic, or as I prefer to refer to it: non-theistic.

Yet I don't care to self-identify as an atheist, chiefly for two reasons.

First, and the biggest reason, is I feel that the label does too little to explain who I am and what makes me tick. I should be as contented to simply call myself a man and leave it at that.

Second, atheism has very bad connotations in the minds of most people, especially here in the Bible Belt, which is and has been my home my entire life (up to the present moment, and I expect for what time I have remaining).

To the many monotheists who follow one of the revealed religions (religions centered on the concept that a personal God has revealed his will to men), to be non-theistic in outlook is to be an enemy of and in rebellion against the Almighty.

Well, that certainly is wide of the mark!

The truth is, that those of us who find a sense of the sacred in the universe and the great mystery of life do endeavor to live in harmony with God, or nature. At the least we seek to understand the laws of nature and allow them to shape our outlook.

Therefore, to a pantheist, the mischaracterization of being haters or enemies of God is a very huge and quite inaccurate insult.

There is something of a religious impulse inherent in the human animal (a byproduct of our expanded brains), and for pantheists such as myself this impulse finds fulfillment in sense of wonder and rapture we experience when contemplating the Cosmos.

Scientists have well expressed this, as for example this passage from the writings of Albert Einstein:

What I see in Nature is a magnificent structure that we can comprehend only very imperfectly, and that must fill a thinking person with a feeling of humility. This is a genuinely religious feeling that has nothing to do with mysticism.

And the nineteenth-century scientist and polymath Johann Wolfgang von Goeth, who wrote:

He who possesses art and science has religion; he who does not possess them, let him get religion.

One of today's best know atheists is biologist, lecturer, and author Richard Dawkins. In his book The Good Delusion he styled pantheism as "sexed up atheism."

Cute.

But I truly feel my sense of awe and reverence for nature as the intricate system it is is best expressed the way the ancient Stoic philosopher Marcus Aurelius expressed it:

Everything is interwoven and the web is holy.

Now admittedly that is a matter of personal taste. I have few stones to throw at atheists such as Dawkins and those who prefer not to use any religious or spiritual jargon to describe their naturalistic worldview. We just have different perspectives. However, I see no good reason to cede religious terminology and expression to the supernaturalists.

For me and many of us, the atheist label just does not do enough to describe who we are, and, what is worse, it gives a negative and false picture of our understanding of things.

For me, the atheist label is a poor fit.

Why I Am A Pantheist

Pantheism: a doctrine that equates God with the forces and laws of the universe (Merriam-Webster Dictionary).

Mine is a reason-driven religious philosophy, not faith-driven. I built my worldview from the fruits of my personal investigations of the reality which surrounds me, not being content to rely on folklore.

There is that prickly concept: God. The absolute, the ultimate, that which is greater than anything else, the ground of all being, the creator of everything.

But the question presents itself: Is God a person(s) or a metaphor?

Here the reason versus faith dichotomy is fundamental.

There are ancient, time-honored traditions that a deity (or deities) created the universe and man and rules over both. Many traditions, in fact. And they are hopelessly contradictory.

We have the well documented fact that throughout history humans have excelled in both imagination and creativity - the ancient religious traditions and myths being but one testament of that fact.

That not one of these imagined deities throughout all the millennia of human history has bothered to reside among and directly communicate with all his creatures and forever set the record straight seems to me - if a not a proof, then at least - an indication that we are dealing with non-entitites.

Humans have always been in awe of their natural surroundings and at the mercy of the terrible forces of nature. These are and always have been recognized as greater than humans.

The same evolving and advancing intelligence that learned to make and use tools, that learned to work along with nature in order to cultivate gardens, orchards, and vineyards for food, that tamed fire and invented the art of cooking, soon and quite naturally imposed those same ideas about design and intention upon those greater forces of nature and the universe that surrounded him. The human mind was obviously personal, and it was no great stretch for pre-scientific man to extend a similar personality to the forces of nature.

Therefore, I understand the stronger postulate to be that man created God(s) rather than the other way around.

Of course the sun and rain were understood to be divine blessings that allowed the nourishing crops to grow. Earthquakes, volcanoes, floods, and thunderstorms were surely signs of displeasure among the deities. Diseases seemed to be of divine origin, and the best treatments, slowly developed over long centuries of trial and error, were those provided by the gods of nature, such as healing herbs, fresh air and sunshine. But to this day we have not conquered the ravages of disease.

Humans throughout history continuously studied nature and learned more and more about her ways. Science slowly emerged as an alternative to mythological theology, although to this day some attempt to keep a foot in each camp.

For me, the scientific method is the true theology or study of God. And with the embracing of the scientific method comes the humbling confession that we don't know everything, and that all our scientific "facts" are provisional facts. The more the universe is studied, the more secrets she yields, and the possibility that certain facts may need to be revised frequently becomes a reality. Still - despite its incompleteness - the scientific method is the best handle on reality we have.

If there is a creator "God" it must the laws of physics that organize the raw elements into this wonderful cosmos. This ability of the elements to self-organize and display apparent design is the divine spark or Logos. It is that from which we came and to which we must eventually return.

In addition to that, God can be well employed as a metaphor for the highest of human ideals, especially with regard to ethics. The understanding that all of us are Citizens of the Cosmos and stand side by side in inherent equality give the greatest impetus to and proper ground for true religious practice and spiritual idealism.

I am a pantheist because, as a part of nature's intelligence, I stand together with my brothers and sisters in awe of the greatest intelligence, which is the well ordered Cosmos as a whole.

Sunday Meditation: The Problem Of Religious Experience

"I know what I saw." "I know what I felt." "I know what happened to me." Personal religious experiences, apparently invading our senses and thrusting upon us the idea of transcendence (in the sense of that which lies beyond the normal perception). These occasions are the most compelling evidence of all for the religious believer. I can exchange ideas with people all day long concerning the spiritual, religious, or numinous, and explain how such experiences can be understood within a purely physical framework, and will do absolutely nothing to cancel out the weight of their personal experiences.

I've had them, and probably so have many if not most of you. People from the beginning of humanity have had them. Of course they have - that is why we have religion in the first place. For some it goes beyond mere ineffable feelings. Some folks have seen visions and heard voices. (I am a frequent experiencer of auditory hallucinations; quite often, rarely when I'm awake, usually while I'm just drifting off to sleep or while in a light state of sleep, I distinctly hear sounds or voices, sometimes calling my name.)

Do such experiences constitute proof positive that there is something otherworldly going on? Personally, I'm skeptical and think that all these things can be comfortably explained in this-worldly terms, if one cares to subordinate emotion to reason (and I am one who does).

That is the subject of today's little meditation. Just a little food for thought about religious experiences from the pen of Prof. Durant Drake and taken from his old but still valuable book Problems of Religion: an introductory survey. Notice especially the weight of his last paragraph:

Experiences themselves do not inform us of their causes; to discover them requires a process of further observation, comparison, and inference, which must be subject to the ordinary laws of logic. But the man who is in the glow of a great emotional experience is in no mood for cool analysis, for the proper application of logical tests, the isolation of factors, the elimination of assumptions. He inevitably explains his experience in terms of whatever conceptions he has at hand, and considers that explanation to be as assured as the experience itself.

For example, many or all of the striking experiences that have reinforced for their subjects the belief in supernatural Beings may conceivably be attributable merely to invasions into the ordinary consciousness from what we now call the "subliminal" region of our minds. Certain temperaments are liable to visions, automatisms, possessions, inexplicable to the subject and inspiring a sense of awe and wonder, of terror or rapture, according to their nature. These phenomena are psychologically similar whether they have any religious significance to the subject or not.

The vision of the apostle Paul, the "speaking with tongues" of the early Christians, the trances of the saints, are only in the happiness they gave and the belief they fostered, not in their psychological nature, different from a million other visions and possessions and trances which have only brought to their subjects uneasiness or alarm. They no doubt accelerated the spread of Christianity, as of other religions — Mohammed was particularly subject to such experiences. They have produced spiritualism in our day. The Society for Psychical Research has investigated many thousands of cases, and the books on pathological psychology are full of them. Some of them are as yet but dimly understood. We are certainly not yet in a position to be dogmatic about these experiences, one way or the other.

But the point is that if, for example, the sound of the Saviour's voice or the vision of his face that comes to the saint is a proof of the outer reality of this voice or face, then the number of objective realities equally well authenticated by psychologically similar sounds and sights is appalling.

Always On The Attack And Getting Tired

Religion fascinates me, but bad religious idea horrify, anger, and prod me into action.

When I look over my blog's archives I'm struck by how many of my posts are of a negative, combative nature. That is because I hate the Christian fundamentalism of my youth and of so many in our nation today, and believe it is a source of hate and division. For that matter, any religion that is based on dogmatic faith over human reason and our right and responsibility to make up our own minds for ourselves is an unwholesome enterprise, at least in my opinion.

I have been thinking long and hard of late about starting a new blog and concentrating my efforts just on my personal spiritual ideas. After all, I rarely get comments or the chance to interact with the people I am most concerned about: those being blinded by bad religious ideas. In effect, I am mostly preaching to the choir here. So, really, a lot of my blog is just the venting of my spleen. Cathartic for me to be sure and perhaps vicariously so for some of you who know from experience the things I vent about, but how far can one go with that? It does get tedious after a while. Besides, I find I enjoy writing the positive posts better.

I really like the concept of my blog. The parable from which the concept was taken, the blind men and the elephant, is a good one I think, with its moral:

So oft in theologic wars the disputants, I ween,
rail on in utter ignorance of what each other mean,
And prate about an elephant not one of them has seen

I know I can't avoid the controversy altogether when discussing the subject of human religious impulse, but I feel the need to rededicate myself to my original purpose when starting this blog. I am getting older, time is getting ever shorter for me (as with all of us, whether or not we pause to think about it), and controversy merely for the sake of controversy is something not worthy of my efforts.

Who knows, I'm sure a kinder, gentler approach would longer hold the attention of those perusing my blog for the first time, and probably offer a chance to make those people think instead of signaling an instant call to raise their hackles.

Anyone care to offer their thoughts about this?

I Wonder What Jesus Would Think About This?

For the past two years the truck above has sat at the end of a moderately busy street that intersects with a fairly busy street. It's the Bible Belt here, you know, so I've grown accustomed to displays of "Jesus Saves," "John 3:16," "In Case Of Rapture...," and such religious promotional slogans plastered prominently on bumpers, automobile back-windows, signs, billboards, and even on people's lawns and houses.

When I first noticed this truck with its "Jesus Is Lord" proclamation sitting in someone's yard, I thought it was both an eyesore and a waste of a good vehicle. It just sits there and has never moved.

Then I recently noticed that the side of the trailer now has an additional message to go with the one on the back. It is an advertisement for a subdivision that has been in the works for the past couple of years and is now completed. And it is a beautiful neighborhood, no doubt about it.

My mom knows the people who are the owners, some Christian friends of hers. Nice people. But really now. Doesn't this appear to be using Jesus and the property owners' Christian status as an advertising ploy? I'm not saying this is immoral or should be illegal or anything like that, and as a non-Christian I suppose it isn't really any of my business. But I still can't resist noticing the tacky linkage of religion with mammon here.

And did you notice the name of this development? Sun Rise Meadows. As in Son (Jesus, Son of God) Rise (as in resurrection from the dead). Perhaps Sun Rise rather than Son Rise will make the not so overtly religious feel comfortable there, too, in addition to those who would get aroused financing their home through fellow Christians. (And isn't sunrise one word when used with reference to the daily astronomical event?)

So I just raise the raise the question: What would Jesus think about this?

Reading the New Testament I don't get the impression that Jesus was very pro-business or concerned about capitalism:

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also (Matthew 6:19-21, NIV).

Moreover, when we read the account of Jesus disrupting the Temple commerce

On reaching Jerusalem, Jesus entered the temple courts and began driving out those who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves, and would not allow anyone to carry merchandise through the temple courts. And as he taught them, he said, “Is it not written: ‘My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations?' But you have made it ‘a den of robbers'" (Mark 11:15-17,NIV).

it's hard to resist the conclusion that Jesus just wasn't a businessman and certainly had no stomach for the mixing of religion and profiteering.

But then his modern day followers never struck me as particularly consistent when it comes to following his teaching.