I was going to write a post about theories theologians have about 'image of God' and how it functions and what it means. But it occurred to me that this needed to be preceded by a post about why all that would even matter. Does thinking about 'image of God' make any tangible difference to how we think about God and people, and to how we treat God and people?
I think it does.
If we think that every human creature 'images' God or bears God's image, then Scripture demonstrates that this informs how we speak to/of them (James) and how we think of them (Matthew: Sermon on the Mount). It puts brakes on our sin. It questions our easy contempt for people who irritate us or hate us. It threatens our sense of superiority. In the end, if everyone does have this valuable 'image of God' in some way, then there is some connection between them and God.
It means that people with mental illness or disability, stroke victims, unborn children,the dying and so forth, are all infinitely valuable. They possess 'humanity' not because they can contribute to the economic growth of the western world, but because of the connection with God which their humanity gives them. And seeing as you can't separate a human person from the state of being human, it means that each person is valuable. Thinking about this issue can give us more courage, I think, to declare the lie which undergirds much of our entertainment industry, if not our society: that only the beautiful people are worthwhile.
A lot depends on how a person understands 'image of God', whether we still possess it after the Fall, how it relates to Jesus as image of God, and other similar questions. But it does make a difference to how we understand ourselves, each other and ulimately God, particularly how we are in relation to him. It doesn't do everything for us, but it does provide a fundamental building block for our understanding on these issues.
It isn't sentimental either, I don't think. There is no sense in which we try and find the best in people we would ordinarily consider ratbags and call that 'image' and start to make outrageously positive comments about them. It's more a driving conviction that bulsters the command to 'love our neighbour'. Sure, we'll do it because Jesus has shown us what love looks like and told us to do it, but when we understand the kinds of things which would lead to this command, it allows us to obey with greater awareness and clarity. Intelligent obedience is almost always better quality obedience and achieves more good for more people.
A lot more has to be said - about sin, about Jesus, about the way image functions, but this will do for a start: image of God isn't a peripheral aspect of human beings, it's central and key to understanding and learning to love people.
Thursday, 18 January 2007
Tuesday, 16 January 2007
Excerise is just medicine, folks. Let's be real.
OK, we need to be clear about exercise.
It is uncomfortable.
It is a waste of time.
It results in a lot of sweat and the need for a shower.
It makes you feel tired, and can cause your legs/other muscles to ache.
The idea that there is some virtue in exercise for its own sake is just demoralising. But there seems to be a conspiracy, where everyone goes on about how good you feel afterwards and so forth. It may be the case for some people, but it just doesn't happen to me. And I can't believe that I am that unusual.
It would be so much easier if they were honest and said, "Look, it's dreadful and it's going to put a hole in your day and you aren't necessarily going to feel better or anything for it. But it is necessary, so just do it".
So, I get my 40 minute walk over early in the day. I don't feel better for it. I don't enjoy it. I don't want to do it. I consider it a very long form of medicine, and I'm glad when it's over and I can go back to my more sedentary and definitely more enjoyable existence.
Glad we've cleared that up.
It is uncomfortable.
It is a waste of time.
It results in a lot of sweat and the need for a shower.
It makes you feel tired, and can cause your legs/other muscles to ache.
The idea that there is some virtue in exercise for its own sake is just demoralising. But there seems to be a conspiracy, where everyone goes on about how good you feel afterwards and so forth. It may be the case for some people, but it just doesn't happen to me. And I can't believe that I am that unusual.
It would be so much easier if they were honest and said, "Look, it's dreadful and it's going to put a hole in your day and you aren't necessarily going to feel better or anything for it. But it is necessary, so just do it".
So, I get my 40 minute walk over early in the day. I don't feel better for it. I don't enjoy it. I don't want to do it. I consider it a very long form of medicine, and I'm glad when it's over and I can go back to my more sedentary and definitely more enjoyable existence.
Glad we've cleared that up.
Monday, 15 January 2007
I'm Back!
Levor and I have been up at Summer School for the mission organisation we support. It was a great time. We had fun with the people we stayed with, got a lot from the Bible teaching times, and were challenged by the deluge of missionary issues and stories.
Being a glass-half-empty kind of person, I was expecting things to not work at all well, so I'm delighted and surprised. It was an excellent way to begin the year.
Being a glass-half-empty kind of person, I was expecting things to not work at all well, so I'm delighted and surprised. It was an excellent way to begin the year.
Thursday, 28 December 2006
Should Hebrew even be legal??
This post is born of sheer frustration. I'm translating the last 20 chapters of Genesis, for another exam I have down the track. In order to get my flabby Hebrew back into shape, I'm making myself find all the verbs the hard way (i.e. in the dictionary rather than the computer).
So, I was hunting for a verb. For those of you fortunate enough not to have made the acquaintance of this recalcitrant language, there are a few tricks to verbs. They're made up of three main consonants, and the vowels (dots and dashes) are added to change the word from a noun to a verb, and all different kinds of verbs. Which is fine. Odd, but fine.
Unfortunately, some of the consonants just disappear, and some others, just for variety turn into other consonants. And of course it's more than just one consonant, so you can be sent on the biggest wild goose chase by these verbs. And they laugh. I just know it!
And that is what this verb did to me. The first and third consonant were irregular, meaning I could only be certain about the second consonant. After a frustrating half hour, I finally went and looked it up on the computer. Then, because I was feeling smug, I went back to the dictionary just to have the satisfaction of finding it in the dictionary.
It wasn't there.
Turns out the computer was wrong. In the end the second consonant was actually the first consonant, and the other two had completely disappeared, and the second consonant of the verb was attached to the beginning of the word making it look like the first consonant only it wasn't really. I can't believe this language sometimes. It takes irregularity to a whole different level and makes me wonder whether it can legally do what it's doing. Surely, there must be laws... somewhere!
But I found the verb.
So, I was hunting for a verb. For those of you fortunate enough not to have made the acquaintance of this recalcitrant language, there are a few tricks to verbs. They're made up of three main consonants, and the vowels (dots and dashes) are added to change the word from a noun to a verb, and all different kinds of verbs. Which is fine. Odd, but fine.
Unfortunately, some of the consonants just disappear, and some others, just for variety turn into other consonants. And of course it's more than just one consonant, so you can be sent on the biggest wild goose chase by these verbs. And they laugh. I just know it!
And that is what this verb did to me. The first and third consonant were irregular, meaning I could only be certain about the second consonant. After a frustrating half hour, I finally went and looked it up on the computer. Then, because I was feeling smug, I went back to the dictionary just to have the satisfaction of finding it in the dictionary.
It wasn't there.
Turns out the computer was wrong. In the end the second consonant was actually the first consonant, and the other two had completely disappeared, and the second consonant of the verb was attached to the beginning of the word making it look like the first consonant only it wasn't really. I can't believe this language sometimes. It takes irregularity to a whole different level and makes me wonder whether it can legally do what it's doing. Surely, there must be laws... somewhere!
But I found the verb.
Tuesday, 26 December 2006
Evangelicalism (I) 19th Century and the Revival
Hi! Here are some of my reflections from all the reading I did for my exam. I passed, by the way! Could be long and boring, but I wouldn't know. I just find it fascinating!! :)
For those of us who are interested in people becoming Christian, the idea of 'revival' is held out at a kind of nirvana. Many, many people becoming Christians all at once is basically what a revival is all about, and that is what most of us long to see happen.
And in the 19th Century, the 'revival' was studied and various means were invented to replicate it. This is particularly the case with Finney's publication regarding Revivals, which changed the shape of revivals in America, but my interest at the moment is the UK, and the change there is considerable.
The revival fitted with church reality after the Wesley and Whitfield revivals of the late 18th Century.* But it was far more of an 'event' by the end of the 19th century. Revivals in the 18th entury particularly occurred among the lower classes, who had no access to the Bible because they couldn't read and were absent from church and didn't hear it read. The Gospel therefore was not something they were familiar with, and often heard it the first time as the W's preached.
And of course, part of the genius of the Wesley and Whitfield approach was the establishment of 'classes' in which people learned to be Christian, often learning how to read in the process.
This was often the case with subsequent revivals. They often were localised, particularly among a group of the same kind of occupation - so fishermen, etc - in the same place. Sometimes there was very little to explain them. They just happened. So, a group of men playing cards suddenly fall down on their knees and cry out to God for mercy for hours. And there's a revival. Sometimes it's more prosaic. A group of Primitive Methodists enter a village with singing and processing through the streets to the field where they try to hold their open air meeting. The village clergymen comes against them with a group of thugs, including a full band. They try to preach but can barely be heard above the band. Then, suddenly the drummer of this band is convicted of sin and then others and revival breaks out.(Presumably this is a lot easier after the drummer starts sobbing and ceases drumming). Of course, sometimes it doesn't work that easily: the preachers are beaten up and some even die in the course of events.
But mostly, these revivals look to me like quicker ways of doing mission. So, in a good church when the Gospel is preached, people in the church will be telling their friends about Jesus and bringing them along to hear the Gospel. And that means that the same kind of dynamic which we see among say the fishermen at Cornwall is at work in that church, only a lot slower. It's not that revival isn't supernatural, it's just that it's as supernatural as all other gospel work, and there's a kind of continuity between the two.
After about 1845, this changed dramatically. People are inventing ways to do revival in a dramatic way. These come to Britain from the USA often, and start to change the way revivals are perceived. The Methodists had started to seriously distance themselves from revivals from the early 1800's, but in the 1840's they send home a revivalist named James Caughey for illicit revival practice. Many Methodists are committed to revivalism and struggle with this rejection of revival and leave (and that's a story in itself). Other Evangelical denominations which have imitated many of the Methodist type strategies - church planting, small groups at churches, centralisation, etc, etc - distance themselves from revivalism also.
The kind of things which start to be a factor in revivals now characterise our understanding of 'revivals': different speaking techniques, singing, altar calls, planting people in the congregation to stand when asked and so on. Prior to that, mission meetings looked different. There were still strategies, but they reflected a different set of priorities. At the camp meetings the Primitive Methodists held, for example, the speakers were limited in how long they could speak, there had to be at least one speaker for the children, people were to be aware of God moving and stop what they were doing if it wasn't contributing. There was no 'revival leader' in these events as such, though a lot of known speakers. I could be wrong, but I suspect it was more of a group affair: people invited their friends, were involved in setting it up and pulling it down (it was a literal 'camp') and were there for people in the event of their conversion and subsequent discipleship. I think you see this also in the interest they have in preaching to children as well - that's the kind of priority that a church type group has. Sometimes of course there were big name speakers, but this was the kind of rhythm of the revivals.
So, I think revivals were part of the way the community of believers did mission(after the initial Wesley ones), and as they became 'professional' they were managed by travelling groups rather than owned by churches. Evangelicals couldn't ignore them, and didn't because of conversions, but they were different, and there was a definite distancing from them in the 1850's, which changed as the century progressed.
Any one of us coming to Christ is miraculous. When God pours his mercy out on many, many people all at once it is mind blowing. But I think the idea which grows up with Finney and others, that we should actively seek revival, is distracting. If we prayerfully work hard to know and speak the Gospel we are doing all that we are responsible to do. God might pour out his blessing, slowly or all at once, but this is his work. And we rejoice in his work when we see it, in big or small ways!
* Note that I'm not claiming that the Wesley revivals were part of the COE church experience. These intial revivals are unusual, but the subsequent ones I think are in the context of the community of believers.
For those of us who are interested in people becoming Christian, the idea of 'revival' is held out at a kind of nirvana. Many, many people becoming Christians all at once is basically what a revival is all about, and that is what most of us long to see happen.
And in the 19th Century, the 'revival' was studied and various means were invented to replicate it. This is particularly the case with Finney's publication regarding Revivals, which changed the shape of revivals in America, but my interest at the moment is the UK, and the change there is considerable.
The revival fitted with church reality after the Wesley and Whitfield revivals of the late 18th Century.* But it was far more of an 'event' by the end of the 19th century. Revivals in the 18th entury particularly occurred among the lower classes, who had no access to the Bible because they couldn't read and were absent from church and didn't hear it read. The Gospel therefore was not something they were familiar with, and often heard it the first time as the W's preached.
And of course, part of the genius of the Wesley and Whitfield approach was the establishment of 'classes' in which people learned to be Christian, often learning how to read in the process.
This was often the case with subsequent revivals. They often were localised, particularly among a group of the same kind of occupation - so fishermen, etc - in the same place. Sometimes there was very little to explain them. They just happened. So, a group of men playing cards suddenly fall down on their knees and cry out to God for mercy for hours. And there's a revival. Sometimes it's more prosaic. A group of Primitive Methodists enter a village with singing and processing through the streets to the field where they try to hold their open air meeting. The village clergymen comes against them with a group of thugs, including a full band. They try to preach but can barely be heard above the band. Then, suddenly the drummer of this band is convicted of sin and then others and revival breaks out.(Presumably this is a lot easier after the drummer starts sobbing and ceases drumming). Of course, sometimes it doesn't work that easily: the preachers are beaten up and some even die in the course of events.
But mostly, these revivals look to me like quicker ways of doing mission. So, in a good church when the Gospel is preached, people in the church will be telling their friends about Jesus and bringing them along to hear the Gospel. And that means that the same kind of dynamic which we see among say the fishermen at Cornwall is at work in that church, only a lot slower. It's not that revival isn't supernatural, it's just that it's as supernatural as all other gospel work, and there's a kind of continuity between the two.
After about 1845, this changed dramatically. People are inventing ways to do revival in a dramatic way. These come to Britain from the USA often, and start to change the way revivals are perceived. The Methodists had started to seriously distance themselves from revivals from the early 1800's, but in the 1840's they send home a revivalist named James Caughey for illicit revival practice. Many Methodists are committed to revivalism and struggle with this rejection of revival and leave (and that's a story in itself). Other Evangelical denominations which have imitated many of the Methodist type strategies - church planting, small groups at churches, centralisation, etc, etc - distance themselves from revivalism also.
The kind of things which start to be a factor in revivals now characterise our understanding of 'revivals': different speaking techniques, singing, altar calls, planting people in the congregation to stand when asked and so on. Prior to that, mission meetings looked different. There were still strategies, but they reflected a different set of priorities. At the camp meetings the Primitive Methodists held, for example, the speakers were limited in how long they could speak, there had to be at least one speaker for the children, people were to be aware of God moving and stop what they were doing if it wasn't contributing. There was no 'revival leader' in these events as such, though a lot of known speakers. I could be wrong, but I suspect it was more of a group affair: people invited their friends, were involved in setting it up and pulling it down (it was a literal 'camp') and were there for people in the event of their conversion and subsequent discipleship. I think you see this also in the interest they have in preaching to children as well - that's the kind of priority that a church type group has. Sometimes of course there were big name speakers, but this was the kind of rhythm of the revivals.
So, I think revivals were part of the way the community of believers did mission(after the initial Wesley ones), and as they became 'professional' they were managed by travelling groups rather than owned by churches. Evangelicals couldn't ignore them, and didn't because of conversions, but they were different, and there was a definite distancing from them in the 1850's, which changed as the century progressed.
Any one of us coming to Christ is miraculous. When God pours his mercy out on many, many people all at once it is mind blowing. But I think the idea which grows up with Finney and others, that we should actively seek revival, is distracting. If we prayerfully work hard to know and speak the Gospel we are doing all that we are responsible to do. God might pour out his blessing, slowly or all at once, but this is his work. And we rejoice in his work when we see it, in big or small ways!
* Note that I'm not claiming that the Wesley revivals were part of the COE church experience. These intial revivals are unusual, but the subsequent ones I think are in the context of the community of believers.
Monday, 25 December 2006
Merry Christmas!
Merry Christmas everyone! I hope today is good and has many enjoyable moments in it for you.
Today reminds me that God has been kind. It's the sort of kindness that comes around once in a reality and changes everything. He's come down to us, been one of us, let us know him, and died for us. He - Jesus - showed us what love looks like in the process, so we can learn how to love the people around us.
So, for all it's glitter and kitzch and so forth, I think Christmas is worth a decent celebration. Enjoy!
Today reminds me that God has been kind. It's the sort of kindness that comes around once in a reality and changes everything. He's come down to us, been one of us, let us know him, and died for us. He - Jesus - showed us what love looks like in the process, so we can learn how to love the people around us.
So, for all it's glitter and kitzch and so forth, I think Christmas is worth a decent celebration. Enjoy!
Friday, 22 December 2006
O Christmas Tree!
A lovely thing happened to me today. My dear friend 'Earthmother' and her little girl, 'Happy Girl' came to visit. They brought presents which is always cool, and these were presents for our Christmas tree.
I am very fond of our Christmas tree. It sits in the middle of our lounge/dining room, and this amuses me because it reminds me of the tree in the middle of one of the character's houses in the Ring Cycle. It has a sword stuck in it, which of course is important for the plot. But it has long amused me that someone would have a tree in the middle of their lounge room. And now we do.
I like our tree because I think it is beautiful. And it is so cool to be able to have a beautiful thing in your house that serves no purpose other than to be beautiful. Functional is usually top priority, and for good reason, but beautiful just for its own sake - that's cool!
And what was particularly cool about my visitors (who drove a long way & even coped with my cold and my messy house) was that Earthmother gave me ornaments for Christmas, and they sparkle. So now there are more sparkly things on the tree.
This is a good thing in my day. A lovely friend, her adorable little girl and some decorations for Christmas.
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