Beyond “Without the Shedding of Blood …” Brad Jersak

Beyond “Without the Shedding of Blood …”

I must say, I am thoroughly enjoying Christian theology in the budding era of a post-retributive Gospel. With the Western rediscovery of the Beautiful News, I’m feeling—dare I say it—positively born again! I am in awe and worship of the Father of Love, the cruciform God enfleshed in Jesus of Nazareth. The symbol of the ‘old rugged cross’ has once again come to represent, for me, God’s essential nature: namely, his self-giving, radically forgiving, co-suffering love. And that’s good news for everyone! On the cross, in the face of human cruelty and bloodlust, God-in-Christ revealed his bottom line character: a mercy that endures forever—the loving-kindness that is everlasting. We discover that ‘the blood of Jesus’—i.e. a metonym for God’s self-offering, sacrificial love—can wash anything. Anything. Anyone.

Still, there will be holdouts who believe real justice requires retribution, vengeance and satisfaction of wrath. It’s okay. Many of us did … for nearly five hundred years. Happily, I can say it’s a passé ‘thing’ and we are starting to get over it. Hang in there! The shelf-life of the vengeful punisher is coming due and should pass away in not too many generations.

Admittedly, that stubborn old retributive system is also rather dangerous. I write this during a weekend when a famous Christian politician declared to the NRA that if she were “in charge,” she’d let terrorists know that “waterboarding is how we baptize terrorists.” Lord, have mercy! Such a departure from the Jesus Way! But don’t hate her for her moment of sacrilege; it is what it is and didn’t come from nowhere. Maybe you’d say it too in the right context for a sufficient honorarium … on the Colbert Report perhaps? We all have our x-amount pieces of silver … this is why Jesus died even for Judas.

Moreover, such betrayals are not merely founded on a secular Constitution; they have rich backstories in Christian theologies of retribution. If, in our theology, God needs to use torture to bring about freedom, why should we be surprised when we become like the One we worship? Just a week or two ago, a radio preacher again made it very clear that if Easter means anything, it “begins with Christ dying to satisfy the wrath of God.”

Some theologians I respect to the point of a borderline man-crush (with apologies to New Testament Wright) repeatedly insist that the Gospel of an angry God who can only be assuaged through a violent sacrifice is just a caricature -- that no one really believes that or preaches it seriously. If only it were true. Sad to say, the caricature defense is an unsubstantiated cliché exposed easily enough by the trick question, “Then how does atonement work?” 

Eternal Torture – Divine or Human Vengeance? by Greg Albrecht

Hell is a subject many religious people get all hot and bothered about. It's one of the most disputed and controversial teachings within Christendom. The squabbling is not about the surety of judgment for depravity and wickedness. Most Christians agree that there is and will be divine judgment for evil. The battle for hell is all about specifications, temperature and longevity. The debate involves comprehending and communicating divine justice—and in the process humans export definitions of time and space into eternity.

But the Bible does not suggest that God needs to import our flawed perspectives into the perfection of his eternity. While the Bible is remarkably silent about hell's specifications, cool heads seldom prevail when precise speculations about hell are on the table. When theories such as the degree of suffering that exists in hell, how hot hell is and how long it lasts are under discussion, blood pressures rise and tension fills the room.

Some Christians take the view that hell is the battleground of true faith. Some draw a line in the sand in defense of the hottest kind of hell possible. Any other view of hell is discounted as a liberal, progressive, faith-denying, slippery-slope perspective that owes its existence to soft-headed humans rather than a theology that insists on sinners in the hands of an angry God. In some religious circles, belief in the most excruciating hell that humans can imagine and describe has come to be seen as one of the acid tests of true Christianity.

There are Christians who believe in judgment, but they are not as dogmatic about all of the details. I am one of those Christians. I believe in the judgment of hell, as defined as eternal separation from God, but I am far from dogmatic about specifics. I believe that the presumed necessity of eternal torture as a vindication and satisfaction of God's wrath is a violent contradiction of God's love and character as revealed in the Bible.

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Knocking Down Our Idols - by Caleb Miller

It has been said that "In the beginning God made man in His image, and man has returned the favor ever since".

What does this mean? It means that in nearly every area our "theology" (thoughts and words we say about God) has been shaped by how we view ourselves. The opposite is also true, how we view our God is largely shaped by how we view ourselves. If we abhor something, we naturally assume that our God abhors the same thing. We can't stand people of a different sexual preference, so we assume that God cannot.

And so it goes. We continue shaping God, molding Him into our image. We do as Paul said in Romans 1:23 - "making the incorruptible God into the image of corruptible man". We cling to idols we have made in our minds, some shaped by preconceived notions of God found on the pages of our bibles, others shape by societal and parental pressure. We hold on to personal vendettas and carve a little more of the idol, until in the end we have a God that looks more and more like a mirror image of ourselves rather than the forever loving Abba of Jesus Christ. 

It's time we knock our idols down. It's time we look to these graven images and insist that they will no longer have any sway over the revelation Jesus has given to us about His Father - whom He called "your Father" to a massive group of unbelievers. The moment we begin using our bibles, doctrines, theological constructs, personal preferences and the like to defend a God that looks nothing like Jesus, we are caught in the midst of idolatry. Brennan Manning has this amazing statement in his book "Abba's Child" where he says: "Have you grappled with the core question of your faith, which is not ‘Is Jesus God-like?’ but ‘Is God Jesus-like”.

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Water to Wine (some of my story) - Brian Zahnd

Ten years later it’s time to tell some of my story…

I was halfway to ninety, midway through life, and I’d reached a full-blown crisis. Call it a garden variety mid-life crisis if you want, but it was something more than that. You might say it was a theological crisis, though that makes it sound too cerebral. The unease I felt came from a deeper place than a mental file labeled “theology.” My life was like that U2 song stuck on repeat — I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For. I was wrestling with an uneasy feeling that the kind of Christianity I had built my life around was somehow deficient. Not wrong, but lacking. It seemed watery and weak. In my most honest moments I couldn’t help but notice that the Christianity I knew seemed to lack the kind of robust authenticity that made Jesus so fascinating. And I’d always been utterly fascinated by Jesus. Jesus wasn’t in question, but Christianity American style was.

I became a committed Christian during the Jesus Movement. I was the high school “Jesus freak” and by the tender age of twenty-two I had founded a church — as ridiculous as that sounds now! After a prolonged slow start I eventually enjoyed what most would call a “successful ministry.” At one point during the 1990’s our church was dubbed “one of the twenty fastest growing churches in America.” I was a success. Ta-da!

But by 2003, now in my mid-forties, I had become, what shall I say?…bored, restless, discontent. From a certain perspective things couldn’t have been better. I had a large church with a large staff supported by a large budget worshiping in a large complex. I was large and in charge! I had made it to the big time. But I had become increasingly dissatisfied. I was weary of the tired clichés of bumper-sticker evangelicalism. I was disenchanted by a paper-thin Christianity propped up by cheap certitude. The politicized faith of the Religious Right was driving me crazy. I was yearning for something deeper, richer, fuller. Let me say it this way —I was in Cana and the wine had run out. I needed Jesus to perform a miracle.

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Could your Evangelical Church be called a Cult? Alan Molineaux

If it quacks like a duck, walks like a duck, and looks like a duck then it is probably a duck: or so the saying goes.

I have been part of the evangelical culture since 1975 when as a teenager I attended a small church in the east side of Manchester, England. At the time I was impressed by the community and the clarity with which they presented their ideas.

Over the years, however, I have seen my fair share of dysfunctionality; some of which was my own. 

There does seem to be a pattern in some of these moments that I believe is worthy of consideration.

First of all let me say that I am committed to remaining within the evangelical community, even though some of my views have been met with the kinds of reaction that suggests others might not agree.

Having said that I am not of a mind to stay silent about important issues just to be seen to tow the party line; it never ceases to amaze me how often people call for silence in the name of unity without recognising how this can have a tendency to enable unhealthy cultures.

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I Thought It Was Good News -- by Chris Falson

This is a demo recording but by popular demand I am making this available before the actual album is recorded later this year.  This song (hopefully) speaks for itself... and while many have felt rejected by Jesus or God... the rejection really comes from people who either should know better... or don't really know at all. 

Share the song around, listen or download it for free or if you want to help fund the revolution purchase the track at the price of your choosing. Cheers!

I Thought it was Good News
by Chris Falson
(c) Leather Chair Songs 2014


There'll be no end to the holy wars
while the one in the right is wielding the sword
in the name of the Lord

yeah a lot of blood has spilled over this living word
But it seems as if nobody ever heard
a word he say

I thought is was good news


When the ones in the pulpit are merely fans
Not friends nor lovers of the son of man
How can they understand his plans

The Kingdom gates no longer open wide
How many bruised and broken will be denied
And have to stay on the outside

I thought it was good news

Yeah sometimes I wonder if we're talking bout the same man
Turned water into wine and healed the deaf and blind
And stepped into the gutter to love this heart if mine


I can read it in Red it says anyone
Any woman and man born under the sun
come on run to me

I don't see any barrier or stipulation
about color or race or orientation
its an open invitation

credits

released 23 April 2014
Drum loops from David Raven, Tambourine from Danny Ybarra, guitars, bass and very tired (on tour) voice from moi    

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