I wanted to let everyone know that the tubal ligation went well, and I’m OK. I’ve spent the last two days being a bum, taking naps and watching movies, including Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland, Coraline, and Under the Tuscan Sun. Today I felt like I had enough brain power to read, so I finally started The Secret Life of Bees. Tomorrow I plan more of the same. I might actually get out of the condo tomorrow and go up on the roof for a little sun. I haven’t bee out since Thursday. Probably be good for me. I hope everyone has a good weekend.

Thanks for all of your prayers and good wishes!

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After I posted my new About Me page, two different people wanted to know why I use Godde instead of God and thought a link should be added to explain the term. One of the challenges The SITS Girls Building a Better Blog Challenge is to answer readers’ questions, so I thought this would be a perfect time to post on why I use the word Godde.

Why Godde and not God? Godde is combination of God and Goddess to show that the Divine transcends gender: Godde is neither male nor female and both male and female since Godde created both men and women in the image of Godde. I believe that  Godde is Mother as well as Father. Instead of using the standard Lord that’s used to translate Yahweh in the Hebrew Scriptures, I use Sophia-Yahweh or Sophia. I will lean more towards feminine references to Godde on my blog as masculine references are just about all you hear in church and society to refer to Godde. I use exclusively feminine pronouns for Godde for this reason as well. You’ll be seeing Sophia and Mother a lot on this blog, and I hope it doesn’t offend you. I hope it will help you to see Godde in new ways and start to walk on new paths with this Godde who cries out like a woman in labor to bring forth her people and nurses them at her own breast (Deut. 32:18, Psalm 22:10; 131:2; Isaiah 42:14; 49:15; 66:13).

Thank you Selena and Margaret for the question!

Do you have any questions that I can answer in future blog posts? If I answer your question I will link to your blog (unless you want to be anonymous).

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I survived four days of no reading and no computer. I learned that I am The Queen of Procrastination. If I don’t read, I watch TV. If I turn off the TV, I listen to NPR. If I turn off the radio, I take naps. It wasn’t pretty. This makes me very glad that I signed up for Cairene MacDonald’s Project Front Burner class that is designed to get procrastinators like me off my ass and doing something. I think the accountability will be good for me. Have you been putting of something? Have you been working on a project for a long time (like three years), like me? You might want to sign up for Cairene’s class.

I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m going to have to look into that whole accountability thing, if for no other reasons to make me set goals and deadlines for those goals. I’m really, really bad about thinking, “Hey, it’ll happen. Inspiration will strike some time today.” Yes, you’re right. I do know better.

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Pentecost over Nature by Farid De La Ossa

This is the sermon I preached last year on Pentecost. It was originally published on June 1, 2009.

She has been here from the beginning, stirring, creating, bringing form to chaos, and life to dust. In the beginning she brooded over the watery chaos waiting for Godde to give the word. In the fire, thunder, and smoke of Sinai she guarded the holiness of Godde and showed that approaching this godde should not be taken lightly. When Elijah looked for Godde in fire, earthquake, and a storm, she came in sheer silence to show that she didn’t always appear with the flash and panache that human beings expect.

She gave birth to the church and is the One who gives us our unity, giftings, and words. But we don’t talk about her that much. In fact, the Church has never talked about the Holy Spirit much at all. She gets brushed to the side. She’s the runt of the Trinity no one wants to claim. And there’s a reason for this. The Holy Spirit scares us. We can’t control her. We can’t put restraints on her. We have our nice neat boxes for the other two members of the Trinity. Godde the Father and Mother is categorized with all of the attributes of Godde and put in the appropriate box. Godde the Son is neatly categorized by word and deed and placed in his box. For centuries theologians, scholars, teachers, and preachers have tried to do the same thing with the Spirit. But how do you put wind into a box?

A Violent Wind

I don’t think it’s an accident that in the Hebrew and Greek spirit, wind, and breath are the same word. All three are taken forgranted and none are really under our control. My favorite metaphor for the Spirit is wind. I’m originally from Oklahoma and have lived in the Midwest for 27 years, so I know something about wind. Wind is unpredictable. You don’t know what it’s going to do. It can give you a wonderful cool breeze on a hot summer day. It can also destroy acres of land and flatten towns and part of cities. As Jesus told Nicodemus you can’t see either the wind or the Spirit but you can feel them. You don’t know where either comes from or where they are going. Wind is not something anyone can control. It decides when it blows and how. It can choose to be still and silent or roaring hundreds of miles per hour. No one tells the wind where to blow, but it will blow you a few blocks up the street on certain days. It’s wonderful when it acts like we think it should, and it’s disastrous when it decides to show its power in straight line winds and tornadoes.

I think this is why we don’t hear too much about the Holy Spirit. We just can’t fit her into those nice, neat systematic theology boxes we put Godde the Father and Mother and Godde the Son in. We can’t even pretend to control her. What do we do with this wonky member of the Trinity who doesn’t fit into all of our nice, neat little boxes with the nice neat little attributes fixed to her box? The Spirit does what she wants and blows where she wants. When she gives a nice breeze of inspiration during private prayer, we love her. When she blows us out of our comfort zones to be peacemakers and love those we’d rather not, we’re not too sure about her and her methods.

Fire and New Life

Just like the wind, fire cannot be controlled either. We love the illusion we control fire in the pits and fireplaces of life, but then a bush fire starts and devastates thousands of square miles. It burns everything it comes across, blown by the unpredictable wind. We like to think the Spirit enriches our lives. We don’t like to think about the devastation that same Spirit can cause. Like the wind and the fire we cannot control Godde’s Spirit. She blows where she wills, convicts where she wills, redeems where she wills, and blows us kicking and screaming into obeying the Beatitudes instead of just giving them lip service.

We see the unpredictable and powerful side of Godde in both the Ezekiel and Acts readings for today. In a vision Ezekiel sees a field of dried, strewn out bones. It looks as if they died in battle, no one buried them. This was an ancient way of making sure people didn’t move onto the next world after death. This is how the Jews saw themselves. They were in captivity, and their land was gone. They had no hope. They would always be captives in a strange land.

But Godde gives Ezekiel a vision, an incredible vision. Godde commands Ezekiel to prophesy to the bones and tell them to come together and become bodies once again. But the bodies are not living just as the human made of clay in Genesis was not living. Then Godde tells Ezekiel to prophesy to the four winds and tell them to blow life back into these corpses. The wind comes and blows through the bodies giving those who had been long dead new life just as Godde’s breath gave life to the first human. Godde’s Spirit once again blows through the earth and gives life. Just as the Spirit gave new life to these long dead people, so will the Spirit blow into the lives of the Jews and restore them as a people in their land.

Bringing Godde Back to Earth

Pentecost by Nora Kelly

In Acts the Spirit is blowing again. This time it’s a huddled little group in a room who have been hiding out and praying for 10 days. Their Messiah has been crucified, resurrected, and now has ascended into heaven. He’s gone again, and left them the responsibility to build the Kingdom of Godde on earth. No pressure there. Jesus told them to wait until the Holy Spirit came. But what exactly did that mean?

It meant something they could not control. She came blowing through the room they were in and blew them out into the streets to proclaim what they had been hiding: the power of God in Jesus Christ, the Messiah. She inspired them with her fire and put her words in their mouths. They spoke in different languages with their Galillean accents to show that it was not the disciples alone who were doing this.

She gave them a new understanding of Scriptures. In Joel’s prophecy the day of the Yahweh is a day of judgment and disaster. Godde vindicates Israel but the nations around Israel suffer Godde’s fury. Now Godde’s Spirit comes to proclaim salvation to all who believe. And God’s Spirit is no longer limited to just anointed leaders like kings and priests. Godde’s Spirit is poured out on all to proclaim what Godde has done. The young and old, male and female, free and slave are in-spirited to tell those around them about Godde’s love and compassion shown in Jesus. No one is left out.

At this point it appears that the Spirit will once again just be for Israel, for the Jews. But this is just the beginning, and the Spirit is going to show that she cannot be restrained and held in one nation, race, or group of people. She blows where she wills among the Gentiles showing them Godde’s love and mercy, and they too will be saved.

Last week in her sermon Vicki noted that as the disciples go and proclaim Jesus as the Messiah they bring Godde back to earth. As the disciples proclaim and show the love of Christ, Godde comes back to earth for good, never to leave again. We see this in this week’s readings. The Holy Spirit does not act without a human counterpart. Ezekiel has to prophesy to the bones and the four winds for life to be resurrected. The apostles and disciples are praying and waiting when the Spirit comes and impels them out into the street.

I’m still not sure whether it’s to Godde’s credit or discredit that she insists on working through us. But that’s what she does. We might never know which way the Holy Spirit is going to blow, but we do know that she is going to blow around and through us. Blowing us out of our rooms and sanctuaries. Blowing us out of our regular haunts and the normal people we hang out with. She blows us onto new roads and into new places to continue to bring Godde’s presence into our world. She continues to empower people to shout out the good news that judgment is not Godde’s last word. That Godde’s last word has always been and will always be forgiveness, love, and mercy. “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved!” Godde’s Spirit blows into our lives, so that we can live Christ-like lives in our world, and that is Godde’s final word.

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I’ve always lived in other worlds. As soon as I learned to read, I began devouring books. If I could understand most of the words, I read it. I was always asking Mom what this word and that word meant, and as a result, Mom soon taught me how to use a dictionary. I was in glasses by the time I was ten. There is no proof, but I think because I read so much, my eyes didn’t think there was anything beyond the length of my arm (or the tip of my nose for that matter). By the time I finished sixth grade, I had read the Little House on the Prairie books, A Wrinkle in Time trilogy (back then it was a trilogy), The Chronicles of Narnia, every Judy Blume book, and too many Nancy Drew books to count. In fact, I would sit down after breakfast on Saturdays with a Nancy Drew mystery and have it finished by supper. Of course, writing stories did not lag far behind learning how to read them.

Role Models

The first time I saw the power and potential of a girl, and later a woman, was in Madeline L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time books. Meg was strong and held her own ground. She did not have special powers and she was not a super-hero, but she did what was right. Her love for her family always compelled her to do the right thing, no matter what it cost her personally. Meg showed me that regardless of your age, you could change the world for the better.

I lived in books filled with girls and women with whom I could relate. I grew up with a complementarian model of who a woman was supposed to be, but I never fit in that mold. I was neither quiet nor submissive, and I was not very proper. I was competitive, opinionated, aggressive, and willing to defend my beliefs. In books I found woman like me, women I wanted to be like.

I will never forget meeting Eowyn in The Two Towers and journeying with her through Return of the King. She was the first woman I met who was also a warrior. She defied the customs of her time, went into battle, and fought for what she believed in. She was the one who destroyed the King of the Nazguls. In Eowyn, I found a sister.

Seeing Humanity in Others

But fiction has done more than just show me what women can do. The genres of science fiction and fantasy also help me to understand what it means to be human. There is a great potential for truth-telling in these genres. I think that is because the worlds in science fiction and fantasy are not “our” world. Because it’s not “us,” “our” culture, “our” world, we can say things that are not readily received in other forums. Over the years, these genres have confronted the prejudices of our world, battling discrimination based on sex, religion, and ethnicity, and going even further to ask, “What does it mean to be human?”

In Children of God, Mary Doria Russell weaves the stories of human and alien through religion. On the world of Rakhat, there are two species: the Jana’ata and the Runa. The Jana’ata will eat the Runa for survival and to maintain the population. Two of the human characters in the book are a Jewish woman, Sofia Mendes, and her autistic son, Isaac. Joining them is Ha’anala, a member of the Jana’ata. Sofia teaches them the Jewish faith. The biblical views begin to change the way Ha’anala looks at her world, and the way she sees the Runa. She realizes all of them are created by Godde. When she is older, she forms a group where the Runa are treated as equals, which becomes a catalyst for starting change in her world. Meanwhile, Isaac has limited speech and dislikes noise. He wants silence and clarity. He works continually on a hand-held computer, looking for what he calls clarity. At the end of the book we find out what he was working on: a symphony. John Clute noted that Isaac “understands the world solely through song, memorizes the genetic codes of the three races into three intercalating tone-rows, and harmonizes them” (Excessive Candour, issue 63, which is no longer online thanks to SyFy’s name change). He calls his composition “The Children of God.” The humans, the Runa, and the Jana’ata are all Godde’s children. The book ends with a question: Where will these three races—all children of Godde—go from here? Children of God makes us think: what does it mean to be made in the image of Godde? To be Godde’s children? Do we really consider those who are “other” (different races, cultures, religions, or ethnicities) as Godde’s children? Would we use and exploit other people if we saw them as children of Godde, or would we radically change the way live as Jana’ata did?

Neil Gaiman creates London Below in Neverwhere: A Novel. A whole world lives beneath the streets of London in old tunnels long forgotten. London Below is populated by those who considered misfits by the inhabitants of London Above. The residents of London Below are seen as homeless, dirty, and destitute. The people of London Above do not even see them; they look right past them. The dwellers of London Below have to talk to them to be seen, but once the conversation is over, the London Abovers forget all about it. Those who reside in London Below are unseen and forgotten people. This challenges the reader to examine how we see people. How do we view those who are considered “misfits”? Do we look past them? Do we see them at all?

Both of these books remind me of the core church doctrine that every single human being on the face of this planet is made in Godde’s image. What do we do with this doctrine, once it is truly realized? Are we able to handle the responsibility this places upon us? What about those we take advantage of, simply because we can? Are there certain people who are invisible to us, who we look through on the street? Fiction has challenged me, throughout my life, to encounter these hard questions, and ask what it means to be human. Godde not only created every human being, but Godde created them in Godde’s own image. I must constantly remind myself to remember this, to live out what I believe.

Male and Female in the Image of Godde

Lately these questions about humanity have morphed into an examination of what it means to be made in the image of Godde as males and females. What does it mean to be a woman created in the image of Godde? What does this look like in our everyday lives?

I’m not sure I’ve found the answer in fiction. But I do know one image from a book that points me in the right direction: Eowyn and Merry in The Return of the King. They ride into battle together, fight together, and defend each other until they are both down. Eowyn does kill the King of the Nazgul, but she could never have done it without the help of Merry. When I think of men and women, made in the image of Godde, this is what I see. Brothers and sisters standing side by side, fighting the evil in our world that would belittle or ignore any person made in Godde’s image, and building Godde’s kingdom together.

All book links are affliate links.

This article was originally published in Christians for Biblical Equality’s E-Quality Newsletter, Winter 2008.

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Soon afterwards [Jesus] went on through cities and villages, proclaiming and bringing the good news of the kingdom of God. The twelve were with him, as well as some women who had been cured of evil spirits and infirmities: Mary, called Magdalene, from whom seven demons had gone out, and Joanna, the wife of Herod’s steward Chuza, and Susanna, and many others, who provided for them out of their resources (Luke 8:1-3, NRSV).

One of the arguments that complementarians make for women staying at home is that it is God’s plan for men to work and financially support the family. As long as I’ve been on the other side of the argument, pointing out that women have always worked and supported their families monetarily, it was only last week when it hit me what these verses were saying. I’ve used these verses to show that women were disciples and followed Jesus in his travels just as the 12 did. But last week it hit me between the eyes: Mary Magdalene, Joanna, and Susanna plus other women “provided for them out of their resources.” The Greek word translated as resources can mean property, possessions, resources, or means. These women financially supported Jesus and his ministry from their own finances.

I’m sure some would say that what they gave Jesus was really the money their husbands made. This could be true for Joanna, but she is the only one with a husband in this passage. Mary Magdalene had no husband, and Susanna is not paired with a husband in these verses. This means their money was theirs. We don’t know how they had these resources. Maybe they were business women like Lydia and Priscilla. Maybe they were widows. But neither woman, nor her resources, is tied to a husband.

It’s a little thing. A little thing that can be easily overlooked. But I think that we should pay attention to this little thing. Women who weren’t tied to a husband, and a married woman who isn’t tied to her home, are following Jesus all over the countryside and supporting him. These little things start adding up to show that roles women played in the Bible are much broader than mother and wife. It also shows the freedom Jesus allowed women to have in his own ministry. He didn’t tell these women to go back home and take care of their husbands and children (and he didn’t tell them to go home, get married, and start having kids). He welcomed them and accepted their support.

These three verses in Luke give us a glimpse of the broader role of women in Jesus’ ministry beyond the home.

Originally posted at The Scroll, April 22, 2010.

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I post I wrote is up at The Scroll: Who Supported Jesus Out of Their Own Resources?

Let me know what you think.

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I had just started working on my thesis in seminary. Tired of being asked if I was going to seminary to be a pastor’s wife, I decided to write a biblical theology of single women in ministry, showing that Godde’s calling for a woman was not dependent on her marital state. My thesis advisor, Dr. Joseph Coleson (professor of Old Testament Studies at Nazarene Theological Seminary), looked at my outline and thesis proposal and told me that I needed to add a chapter addressing the Creation Story in Genesis 1:1–2:25. He thought that I needed to deal with the second creation account found in Gen. 2:5-25, where woman is created to be an ezer cenegdo to the man. If the Hebrew phrase simply meant, “helper” then could a woman hold a leadership position in the church, let alone a single woman? But if that isn’t what ezer cenegdo meant, then that would open up the vistas I needed to write and successfully defend my thesis. Defend, not in front of the professors at seminary, but to defend against those who say woman was created to be a wife and mother, and only a helpmate for her husband. Dr. Coleson said the translators who translated our Bibles into English know that “helpmate” is a gross mistranslation of the Hebrew phrase, and he did not see how they could look themselves in the mirror day-to-day keeping that misintepretation in the Bible. It is the only time I saw him angry. So what does this little Hebrew phrase mean?

Ezer is used 20 times in the Old Testament: seventeen times to describe Godde and three times to describe a military ally or aide. “Help” or”helper” is an adequate translation, but English has different nuances than the Hebrew does. In English “helper” implies someone who is learning, or under a person in authority. In the Hebrew “help” comes from one who has the power to give help–it refers to someone in a superior position. That is why Godde can help Israel: Godde has the power to do so. Godde helps Israel because they do not have the power to help themselves.

There is another possible definition for ezer: “power” or “strength.” Both words are from the same Hebrew root and the nouns would be identical. We see this when ezer is translated as either “helper” or “power/strength” in the name of the the Judean king, Uzziah. Uzziah means “Godde is my strength.” The other spelling of his name, Azariah, means “Godde is my help.” There are also poetic passages where “power” or “strength” are the only logical translations of ezer. It is clear that in some passages the root for ezer is “helper,” and in others it is the root for “power.”

Cenegdo is two prepositions: together their literal meaning is “facing.” ke is the first preposition, and it means “like” or “corresponding to.” Negdo means to stand in someone’s presence. Paired with ke it means to be in the presence of an equal. Together these two prepositions show the relationship between two people: it means they are standing or sitting facing each other, which shows they are equals. Ezer cenegdo does not mean–or even imply to mean–that one who is subordinate or inferior in creation or in function. Woman was created to be a power equal to man; an autonomous being that God created so that the man would have someone like him, and equal to him, to share his life with.

The man acknowledged this when he saw the woman. In the second poetic passage in the Bible he proclaimed: “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh”! He knew at last an ezer cenegdo had been brought to him. His speech reinforces the woman as his equal. Unlike the animals she corresponds to him–she is like him; there is mutuality, unity and solidarity. The man recognized what Godde had done by calling her woman and saying she came from man. The narrator then stated, “Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and clings to his wife, and they become one flesh” (Gen. 2:24). This seems odd saying considering that in all Near Eastern cultures it was the woman who left her family to live with her husband and his family. Again we see that one is not above the other. Flying in the face of patriarchal culture, the mandate for marriage is one where the man leaves his family and clings to his wife.

In the beginning men and women were both created in the image of God (Gen. 1:27), and they were created to be equals. They were both given the commands to be fruitful and to rule over the earth (Gen. 1:28-30). The woman was not created to be a subordinate helper to her husband. She was created as an autonomous being; she was a complete human being, just as the man was. Her existence was not dependent on him as his existence was not dependent on her: their existence depended on Godde alone who created them both.

This leads next to the assumption that since woman was made because it was “not good that the man should be alone” (Gen. 2:18), and the first marriage covenant comes after man’s declaration of woman being “bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh” (Gen. 2:23), that a woman’s primary purpose is marriage and that should be her primary goal in life as well. Even though woman was created to alleviate the man’s loneliness and provide him an ezer cenegdo, men are not raised to believe that marriage should be their primary purpose and goal in life. For men their main purpose is a career. How are single women with a call to ministry to react to the attitude that they are just “playing ministry” until Mr. Right comes along? What are married women with a vocation outside of the home or a call to lead in church to do? After all isn’t Genesis 2 clear that marriage is the God-ordained, and therefore, the “natural” state to be in, and that is what woman was created for?

Many women have been counseled to put off their dreams of continuing their education or pursuing a time-consuming career because what happens when they meet their “perfect husband” who will be “Godde’s perfect plan” for them? If the women are more educated or make more money how will their potential spouses feel? Women have been told “you are called to be a wife first,” based on Genesis 2. Whether or not they want to marry is irrelevant–they will, that is Godde’s plan for every woman. Is this what Genesis 2 says?

Could the comment that it is not good for man to be alone simply be an admission that human beings are meant to live in community? Scanzoni and Hardesty note that marriage isn’t the only relationship possible where human beings are concerned. No one person is self-sufficient–we are dependent on Godde and on each other. Human beings were created to have relationships with Godde and with one another. We are designed to be in community, and no one person can be whole and complete apart from communion with Godde and one another.

Certainly marriage is a part of Godde’s design, and marriage is to be the ultimate expression of love, fidelity, and sexuality, but it is just one of many relationships. As Christians we must remember that marriage is not the supreme relationship: the supreme relationship of any believer’s life is with Godde; our relationship with Godde is what makes us whole and complete.

Although I began this with Genesis, I would like to end with what the New Testament has to say about women and ministry. Christians believe that Jesus Christ came to redeem all people–both men and women–and now “there is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:28). We also believe “in [Christ] you have been made complete” (Col. 2:10, NASB). The doctrine of salvation through Christ means that any hierarchical structure that is a result of the Fall is now done away with (For more on what the Fall meant for women, see The Fall and Women). All of us have equal standing before God. Our relationship with God through Christ is what completes us and makes us whole. All women, including single women, do have a place in the church because God created us, redeemed us, and made us to be complete and whole persons in Christ.

At Pentecost the Holy Spirit filled all the believers gathered in the Upper Room–both men and women–and they went out to the streets proclaiming everything they saw in the last few weeks. It is reasonable to believe that the women who were at the foot of the Cross were in the upper room as well (It is worth noting that only the women could give eye witness account to both the burial and resurrection of Jesus). In the Synoptic Gospels, those women are all identified by their sons, not their husbands. This leads me to believe that they were widowed; they were single. It is possible single women proclaimed the death, resurrection, and ascension of Christ on the day that 3,000 were saved. When the Holy Spirit came, she came to all: men, women, married, single, old, and young alike, which Peter affirmed in his sermon. All that Godde required of those believers was obedience: they stayed in Jerusalem until the Holy Spirit came, and then they all went out and proclaimed what Godde had done. Whether one is married or single, male or female, is irrelevant in the Kingdom of Godde. All that is required is obedience to the call and the will of Godde.

Sources:

Shawna Renee Bound, Your Daughters Shall Prophesy: A Biblical Theology of Single Women in Ministry, unpublished thesis, (© by Shawna Renee Bound 2002), “Helpmate or Power Equal to Him?” 11-22.

Joseph Coleson, Ezer Cenegdo: A Power Like Him, Facing Him as Equal (Grantham, PA: Wesleyan/Holiness Women Clergy), 1996.

Loren Cunningham and David Joel Hamilton, Why Not Women? A Fresh Look at Scripture on Women in Missions, Ministry, and Leadership (Seattle, WA: YWAM Publishing), 2000.*

J Lee. Grady, Ten Lies the Church Tells Women, How the Bible Has Been Misused to Keep Women in Spiritual Bondage (Lake Mary, FL: Charisma House), 2000.*

Letha Dawson Scanzoni and Nancy A. Hardesty, All We’re Meant to Be: Biblical Feminism for Today, 3rd rev. ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.), 1992.*

Aida Besançon Spencer, Beyond the Curse: Women Called to Ministry (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers), 1985.

Phyllis Trible, God and the Rhetoric of Sexuality (Philadelphia: Fortress Press), 1978.*

All biblical translations are from the New Revised Standard Version unless otherwise noted.

* Affiliate links

This article was originally posted on May 25, 2007.

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Have you ever thought: “I’m saved, now what?” Or “I know I’m a Christian, but there has to be more to Christian living than waiting around for heaven.” If so, After You Believe: Why Christian Character Matters* is the book for you. Bishop N. T. Wright (Anglican Bishop of Durham, England) has taken up the topic that most Protestants have been shying away from or vilifying for the last 500 years: good works. First Wright picks up with the topic of his last book, Surprised by Hope*, which corrected one of the biggest fables of Christianity: that heaven is the ultimate destination of the Christian. Our ultimate hope is not as disembodied spirits somewhere out there. The true Christian hope is bodily resurrection and inhabiting the new earth and new heavens. After You Believe tells us what difference our ultimate hope makes in living this life in this body (both individual and corporate) on this earth. Because we are called to be priests and one day will rule creation with Christ in the new earth, we need to learn the ways and language of that new world and that new way of life.

The way we learn to live this new life and prepare for our roles in God’s new creation, is through learning and living the Christian virtues of faith, hope, and love. This goes beyond a “keeping the rules” mentality or the “if you go with your heart you can’t go wrong” philosophy. Like learning a new language or learning how to play an instrument, this is not easy or natural at first. But the more we keep committing ourselves to choosing the ways of faith, hope, and love, the easier it becomes until it is second nature. Wright ties the Christian virtues to the fruit of the Spirit: “the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, greatheartedness, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self control” (p. 194). He notes that “‘the fruit of the Spirit’ does not grow automatically. The nine varieties of fruit do not suddenly appear just because someone has believed in Jesus, has prayed for God’s Spirit, and has then sat back and waited for ‘fruit’ to arrive” (p. 195, emphasis author’s). Just like gardening which takes pruning, watering, mulching, and looking out for blight and mildew to grow plants, we each have to cultivate a life in which the fruit of the Spirit can grow. For those who think that the Spirit’s fruit does come automatically Wright points them to the last characteristic on the list: self-control. No one comes by self-control automatically: it’s something everyone has to work on and develop throughout his or her life.

The final chapter of the book describes how virtue can be practiced, and how we learn to start living as the priests and co-rulers that we will be in the new creation. Wright calls it the virtuous circle, and the circle includes Scripture, stories, examples, community, and practices. It is by engaging with this circle as both individuals and communities, that our character will be transformed and loving God and loving others will become our second nature. These practices will prepare us for the new language and the new way of life that we will have in the new creation. There is an excellent “For Further Reading” appendix for those who want to delve more into virtue, Christian virtue, ethics, and character.

My few criticisms about the book have more to do with style than content. Wright does get repetitive, and you go over a lot of the same ground again. I was also annoyed when he would bring up a subject then say we would get to that later on in the book. It happens numerous times, and I thought: wait till we get to that part before bringing it up. There are also several occasions where he makes a comment, then says something to the effect of, but we can’t go into that here; it’s another book. If those asides are any indication, there are several more books on the way.

Overall I thought this was a good, informative book, and it starts to fill a gaping void in Protestant practice: where do good works and character fit into the Christian life without becoming something we have to do to earn salvation. I recommend it for anyone who wants to know more about how to live as a Christian in this body, in this world, at this time.

*Affliate Link

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received the product mentioned above for free by The Ooze Viral Bloggers in the hope that I would mention it on my blog. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.” This article has been reposted at The Ooze Viral Bloggers.

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Instead of preaching a sermon, I dramatically told these stories based on the lectionary readings for this last Sunday, the 5th Sunday in Lent.

Isaiah 43:16-21, Psalm 126, Philippians 3:4b-14, John 12:1-8

Props

• Jewish prayer shawl or yamika
• Bible (I used my Hebrew Bible)
• If you’re a women a shawl, scarf or pashima that can used as a head covering. If you’re a man a clay jar or other container.

Returning from Exile

(Put on the prayer shawl or yamika.)

May by the prophets really are nuts. We all know the stories: Isaiah running around Jerusalem naked. Not that anyone remembers what his point was–he was running around Jerusalem naked. Hosea marrying a whore to prove Judah’s idolatry was harlotry, and Ezekiel. Now there was a loon. Ezekiel came with the first group of exiles shipped to Babylon. He laid bound up one side for months then rolled over and laid bound up on the other side for months. Something about how long we’d be in exile. Did you know that man didn’t even mourn when his wife died? Said God told him not to because God wouldn’t mourn for the destruction of Jerusalem or the Temple. We Jews are used to our prophets being a little…unbalanced.

I think being in exile so long has unhinged this new group of prophets. Running around saying that some uncircumcised, pagan, Gentile is God’s anointed. Anointed by God like King David. Oh I know Cyrus and his Persian army are making trouble for Babylon, but to call him God’s anointed, and say God is going to use him to send us back to Israel. Like that is ever going to happen. But these prophets keep yammering on about God doing new things—things that will amaze us and dazzle us. They keep talking about rivers springing up in the desert, and God turning the wilderness into an oasis. Talk that’s all it is. We’ve been here for 80 years. Jerusalem was razed to the ground and the Temple with it. We aren’t going anywhere.

I ate every single one of those words. Those loony prophets were right! God did it! God did something totally new! Who ever heard of an emperor letting captives go back to their native land? But Cyrus did! He sent us home! And he returned all of the things that were in the Temple plus what we would need to rebuild the city and the Temple! And it’s a good thing too. Because we’re going to need every penny. The Babylonians literally did flatten Jerusalem. We have a lot of work to do, both building and farming. We have to have enough food to eat. But we are here. God really is sovereign over every ruler on earth. God did not forsake us. God brought us back. And we will rebuild this city and this country. Not just for us. We will rebuild for our children and for all the generations that will come after them.

Paul

(Pick up the Bible.)

People think I’m a little over the top. They say I only see black and white or good and evil. They say I like to rant, and that I’m not all the eloquent. Well what do they expect? Jewish prophets have always been melodramatic. Our people have always known how to get your attention and make our point. Of course, it probably doesn’t help that I’m a zealot. Whatever I do, I go all the way. When I was studying to be a Pharisee, I was always at the top of my class. So you know, I have the equivalent of five or six Ph. Ds in this: The Hebrew Scriptures. I studied with the best teachers, and I kept the Law. I did everything I could to climb the ecclesiastical ladder as fast as I could. When a cult started by this upstart carpenter, who had gotten himself crucified, started taking over the Temple and declaring the Law to be a thing of the past, I was more than happy to help put them away. I wanted to keep the Jewish faith pure. I hunted those people down and threw them into prison. I helped execute them.

Then this crucified carpenter, this Jesus, got hold of me, and I became as zealous for him as I had been for the Law. A lot has happened in the last 30 years, since I found myself blind by the side of the road to Damascus. Christianity has spread across the Empire, and I’m here in Rome. Not the way I wanted to be, awaiting a trial before Caesar. But I am here, and I still preach the Gospel. That one thing has never changed. To whoever listens I tell them about the all-encompassing love of Christ. When I tell the Philippines that I would give up everything to know Christ, they know I’m not exaggerating. I’ve already given up so much: my career, my reputation, my family. I have suffered. What I dealt out to Christians those many years ago, I have now experienced. I’ve been in prison, been beaten, and ran for my life. I haven’t been executed, yet.

I’ve done all of this for one reason: to know Christ. Knowing Christ is worth everything I gave up, everything I loss when I chose to follow him. Christ suffered before he was resurrected. As he said no student is above the teacher. I know all of my suffering has not been in vain. I have come to Christ through my sufferings, and one day my hope is that I will know his resurrection as well. And fully know him as he knows me.

I’m always in awe of how Jesus came back to Jerusalem knowing the suffering and death that awaited him. And Mary, dear Mary who like the prophets before her, performed an outrageous act to prepare him for that final journey to Jerusalem.

Mary of Bethany

(Take off prayer shawl/yamika and put on the head covering, or pick up the clay jar.)

Bethany is not that far from Jerusalem. I hear all of the talk, all of the gossip. I know the Jewish leaders want to kill Jesus. I’m sure they’re even more determined now that Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead. Lazarus. I can’t believe my brother is sitting there, talking and laughing with Jesus and all of our friends. We’re having a big feast to celebrate. People have been in and out of the house all day to see Lazarus alive. There’s whispers and talk all around about revolution; how Jesus will march into Rome and overthrow the pagan overloads. Even the 12 are talking of revolution. It makes me wonder if they’ve been listening to the same teachings I’ve heard at his feet. Do they just tune him out when he says he’s going to die? They don’t want to hear it. They want a king, and the power that comes from being in the king’s inner circle. They are not listening. Either to Jesus or the rumblings of Jerusalem’s ruling elite who will do whatever they have to to hold onto their power. This Messiah will not be going to Jerusalem to be crowned. He is going to Jerusalem to die.

I come out of my revery and realize that I need to go see if Martha needs any help. Then I see it—the jar of nard. Very expensive nard. We had bought it for Lazarus’ burial. It hadn’t been used. I knew what I needed to do. I peeked into the room and everyone was settling around the table. I waited. I waited until they were settled and started eating.

I took the perfume and walked to where Jesus was reclining. I wasn’t going to anoint his head—kings had their heads anointed. I wasn’t going to do anything to feed their illusions. I knelt at this feet. The last pair of feet I had anointed has been Lazarus’ for his burial. I felt the stares. I broke open the jar and poured the nard over Jesus’ feet—all of it. I heard the gasps as people smelled the expensive perfumed mixture. I gently rubbed it into his feet—those roughened feet that soon would be making their last journey. I reached for a towel to wipe off the excess when it hit me I hadn’t grabbed a towel. I always forget something. An idea flickered in my mind. I took out the pins that held my hair. As my hair tumbled around me, another round of gasps echoed around the room. A respectable woman wouldn’t do that! I didn’t care. With my hair, I wiped the oil from his feet. I looked up and Jesus’ eyes met mine. His eyes echoed my thoughts. We both knew. It was a holy moment.

Until an indignant voice broke the holy moment. “Why was this perfume not sold for 300 denarii and the money given to the poor?”

Judas. Of course, it was Judas. Like he had any concern for the poor. He just wanted to line his own pockets.

I took a breath to say as much when Jesus said, “Leave her alone. She bought it so that she might keep it for the day of my burial. You will always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me with you.”

The room was silent. No one wanted to admit what Jesus said was true. He wasn’t here to reorder one nation according to their standards. He was here to turn the world, as we knew it, on it’s head and bring the kingdom of God—the reign of God—to this very world. But for that to happen first he had to face his destiny in Jerusalem.

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