The Truth in Miracles

 

The Gospel readings for the last two weeks recount two of the signs in the Gospel of John.  John’s Gospel has seven signs or miracles performed by Jesus.  The first is the great one for any wine lover, when Jesus changes the water into wine at a wedding when the host had done the unforgiveable and run out of wine.  The last sign, and last week’s Gospel, was the raising Lazarus from the dead.

The miracles recorded in the bible, can be a test of faith for Christian believers and a reason that many people have in not being able to believe the word of God presented in the bible.  It is, I believe, a key to understanding the relationship between God and humans – between the Divine and the human. 

Catholic biblical scholar Murray Watson gives a continuum of possibilities in how to understand the inspired nature of the relationship between the Divine and the Human.    

 

 

  

 It struck me that this is a good illustration of the challenge that miracles bring to people in our culture today.  The belief in the part which God plays in the world relates directly to how miracles are understood and accepted or not accepted by people.  On the one end of the continuum, the stories of miracles in the Old and New Testaments in the bible are actual, literal accounts of the events.  On the other end they are made up stories which have no validity as factual accounts of actual events.

To illustrate, how do you understand the account of the flood in Genesis in which God told Noah to build an arc to hold a pair of every kind of animal to enable them to survive the flood which God sent upon the face of the earth?  Whether you believe that this actually happened as recorded in the Book of Genesis or was just a “myth” i.e., it didn’t happen, can create an inseparable barrier to people exploring with each other how God is working in their lives today. 

In my view, there is little to be gained by arguing over the details of this account or other accounts of miracles in the bible.  If we can put aside the issue of the historical nature of the event, and whether the details are historical facts, we are much more likely to have a meaningful discussion of how God in working in our lives today.  Rather than argue over the truth of the facts of the case, we can explore the capital ‘T’ Truth of how God was operating in the lives of the people who wrote down the account and explore that Truth in our lives today.

For me, the story of the flood shows that God’s creation is redeemable regardless of how fallen the world seems to be.  God can and does work through individuals who can work to redeem the world against impossible odds.  That is certainly applicable to the world today as we see the challenges that are facing the world from pandemics, to an outbreak of conflict between the Israeli and Palestine, and now the war between United States and Iran - not to mention the chasm that exists between political parties in our neighbour to the south.  To me, it doesn’t matter whether or not a person named Noah existed and whether or not he built an arc that held all those animals.  The Truth is that God has and does work through people to bring about the salvation of the world.  We can have hope in that and not give into despair when we read today’s news.

Blessings on your journey and may you know the Truth of God in your life.

Who are those people driving horse powered buggies?(2)

Last time, I wrote about being with a group that experienced a meal provided by an Amish family here on Prince Edward Island.  In this edition, I want to explore what I found out about the Amish faith.  First, I must confess that I didn’t know much about the Amish faith beyond what I had seen in movies.  I had been aware that they were like old order Mennonites in terms of how they lived eschewing modernity.  They don’t drive motor vehicles and use horse powered vehicles i.e. horse and buddies and horse powered machinery for farming.  I had encountered them on the roads near us here riding in their horse drawn buggies and had seen Amish children riding bicycles without pedals.  I was also aware of their distinctive black clothing – the distinctive hats worn by men and bonnets for women. 

At the meal, I was further enlightened about the Amish lifestyle – actually, the Amish way of life would be a better term.  There was no electricity in the house and wood was used as a source of heat and cooking – not a surprise.  Oil lamps were used for light - I mentioned last time that a lamp was hanging from an old electric light fixture.   

The first indication of their faith life was the blessing at the beginning of the meal.  I discovered on-line later that this is a common way of praying for the Amish.  I enquired after the meal about the Amish religious life of that community.  I was informed that the community of nineteen families had three ministers and one bishop.  The worship service on Sundays was held at different homes – no church building.  The worship had hymns at the beginning and end of the worship service which were sung acapella in German.  There was silent prayer as well as spoken prayers including the Lord’s Prayer and a sermon by one of the ministers or the bishop and readings of scripture.  I neglected to find out it the bible they used was also in German.  However, research online notes that the Amish typically use a German version of the Martin Luther Bible. 

Putting the Amish faith in the context of the Christian religion - according to Wikipedia, “The Amish church began with a schism in Switzerland within a group of Swiss and Alsatian Mennonite Anabaptists in 1693 led by Jakob Ammann. Those who followed Ammann became known as Amish.”  Below is a wonderful illustration of the Christian Family Tree with all its many branches which was provided by Murray Watson who teaches courses in Religion at Huron University College.  Note that the Amish are on the Radical/Anabaptist branch of the tree which is comprised of the Hutterites, the Amish and the Mennonites.  The chart shows the membership of the Anabaptist branch has an estimated membership of five million in 2014. 

There is much about the Amish way of life that is commendable in this day and age.  The people who hosted the meal were jovial and upbeat and seemed to be very content in the life they have.  They appear to live their faith which is something which many Chirstian don’t do in my estimation.  We would be blessed to follow their example and live out our faith – whatever it is – more fully. 

    

The Truth About Miracles

 

As I wrote last week, I am currently engaged in a biblical study course on the Old Testament.  Last weeks lecture raised the question about the human involvement in divine action – specifically, what does it mean for scripture to be inspired by God?  The following chart offered by the leader, Murray Watson, gives a continuum of possibilities in how to understand the inspired nature of the relationship between Devine and Human beings.

A spectrum of possibilities in terms of the human-divine relationship

 It struck me that this is a good illustration of the challenge that miracles bring to people in our culture today.  The belief in the part which God plays in the world relates directly to how miracles are understood and accepted or not accepted by people.  On the one end of the continuum, the stories of miracles in the Old and New Testaments in the bible are actual, literal accounts of the events.  On the other end they are made up stories which have no validity as factual accounts of actual events.

To illustrate, how do you understand the account of the flood in Genesis in which God told Noah to build an ark to hold a pair of every kind of animal to enable them to survive the flood which God sent upon the face of the earth?  Whether you believe that this actually happened as recorded in the Book of Genesis or was just a “myth” i.e., it didn’t happen, can create an inseparable barrier to people exploring with each other how God is working in their lives today. 

In my view, there is little to be gained by arguing over the details of this account or other accounts of miracles in the bible.  If we can put aside the issue of this historical nature of the event and whether the details are historical facts, we are much more likely to have a meaningful discussion of how God in working in our lives today.  Rather than argue over the truth of the facts of the case, we can explore the capital ‘T’ Truth of how God was operating in the lives of the people who wrote down the account and explore that Truth in our lives today.

For me, the story of the flood shows that God’s creation is redeemable regardless of how fallen the world seems to be.  God can and does work through individuals who can work to redeem the world against impossible odds.  That is certainly applicable to the world today as we see the challenges that are facing the world from pandemics to a new outbreak of conflict between the Israeli and Palestine - not to mention the chasm that exists between political parties in our neighbour to the south.  To me, it doesn’t matter whether or not a person named Noah existed and whether or not he built an ark that held all those animals.  The Truth is that God has and does work through people to bring about the salvation of the world.  We can have hope in that and not give into despair when we read today’s news.

Blessings on your journey and may you know the Truth of God in your life.

Reconsidering the God of the Old Testament

I am currently auditing an Old Testament course at Huron University College in London Ontario.  I signed up for it after getting a taste of what was on offer at the first lecture which is, of course, offered by Zoom.  Lorna had signed up for the course so it is through her encouragement that I was introduced to what should be a very engaging overview of a subject that is well worth exploring further.  The course is being led by Murray Watson who did a great job in the first lecture and left me wanting more.   

I have not taken a formal course in the Old Testament since studying theology at Huron almost twenty years ago, so I thought this would be a good way to dip my big toe into those very deep waters again.  I must confess that I have always been fascinated by the Old Testament ever since I was captivated by all the stories of heroes such as David the shepherd boy slaying the giant Goliath or the blind Samson pulling down the building and killing all those evil Philistines.  The stories of Jesus in the New Testament just didn’t do it for the young me until much later when I could more fully appreciate that love can be more powerful than heroic acts even when the underdog defeats the forces of evil.   

The Old Testament of the Christian bible is deep water with many currents and eddies and even rip tides that can be hard to navigate for Christians who follow Jesus who proclaimed and lived out his life as the son of a God of love.  The first lecture had an interesting exploration of these challenging waters with a short discussion of the heresy of Marcion.  Marcion who was a second century Christian theologian who taught that the malevolent God of the Old Testament was a different God than the benevolent one of the New Testament who sent his son Jesus Christ to redeem the world. 

Now Marcion was heretical and indeed wrong in his belief that the God who made a covenant with Abraham and wrestled with Jacob was not the God whom Jesus Christ prayed to as his Heavenly Father.  However, even a cursory reading of the Old Testament will reveal what might have been the basis of his heresy.  The OT God who – as an aside had many different names such as Elohim, El-Shaddai, Yahweh, Jehovah and Adonai – did not seem to often believe in justice for people who were not his chosen ones despite what the prophets proclaimed and was not slow to anger as the psalmist sang – at least not always.  Yahweh would have wiped out the Israelites after they demanded the Golden Calf to worship if it wasn’t for the intercession by Moses.  It is this God who sent the flood and drowned the world and everything in it except for Noah and the favoured few people and animals in the Arc.  Yahweh also commanded the Israelites slaughter of the inhabitants of the Promised Land, “You shall annihilate them—the Hittites and the Amorites, the Canaanites and the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites—just as the Lord your God has commanded.” (Deuteronomy 20:17)

So, how do we reconcile the difference between the God the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament without following Marcion down the dead end of his heresy?  How can we reconcile the apparent differences in the actions and behavior of God?  I believe that it was not God that was different but rather, it was the people who saw and heard God through the lens of their culture and times.  The people of the OT were not ready to appreciate a God that did not have at least some of the characteristics that we see as negative today.  Similarly, people today are not ready to embrace the message of what it means to pick up our crosses and truly follow Jesus - I am in no way claiming I do this a lot of the time.  For me the key is in John 16:12-13 - "I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. ¹³When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come." 

Murray Watson addressed this in a more learned manner in a response to me:

I prefer to think more in terms of "evolution" and "transformation" over time (as you suggest in your message). We often speak of "progressive revelation" over hundreds of years, and you're right ... those who received some of that revelation in the earlier centuries lived in a world of warriors, constant violence and battles ... and their understanding of God definitely fit into that familiar framework. I often go back to what I learned in my university courses in Thomistic philosophy; St. Thomas Aquinas said (in Latin): "Quidquid recipitur ad modum recipientis recipitur" (Whatever is received, is received according to the mode of the recipient) ... as human beings, we are conditioned by our time

Carl Jung affirmed the same point when speaking of people not being conscious enough to appreciate the truth of the world in which we live, “There does seem to be unlimited knowledge present in nature, it is true, but it can be comprehended by consciousness only when the time is ripe for it.”  I do wonder how the people of the future will regard the follies and foibles and atrocities of our world.

Perhaps we are blessed if we can do our utmost to avoid heretical paths on our journey.

The Christian Family Tree

With Palm Sunday being celebrated last Sunday, we are now in Holy Week with the anticipation of the Great Triduum; The Great Three Days of Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, The Easter Vigil and Easter Sunday.  I know this actually is four days but that Religion for you.  But actually, it is counted from the evening of the Maundy Thursday service, with the foot washing, to the end of the Great Vigil Saturday evening in which the resurrection of our Lord and Saviour is celebrated with the return of the light of Christ to the world.  It recalls the passion, crucifixion and resurrection of our Lord. This is the foundational story of Christianity. 

I was reminded of how important this is to us when I attended a session on a class on Luther a few weeks ago.  Lorna is taking that class at Huron University College, Luther: Love Him? Loath Him? Learn from Him, which commemorates the 500^th anniversary of the Reformation.  I audited the class on that occasion being April 1^st as we were in London to celebrate my birthday (yes, I am an April Fool and am proud of it). 

The professor, Murray Watson, who is a very engaging teacher, provided a hand out entitled, The Christian Family Tree compiled by Rev. Nathan L. Bostian.    This diagram has Jesus Christ as the “root and foundation” with all the major branches of Christianity which have sprung up in the two thousand years since then.  It has all the main branches which we are familiar with including the Anglican dated in 1536.  It gives the Denomination rating with such things as “T” for Use of Tradition, “W” for Style of Worship and “S” for Structure with a scale from 1 to 10 for each.  Anglicans are rated T4 with 1 begin conservative in tradition and 10 being liberal; W2 for with 1 being sacramental and 10 experimental; and S2 with the range between hierarchical and congregational.  This seems to be fairly accurate for Anglicans.  Of course there is a great range of difference between Anglo-Catholics and whatever the opposite is within the Anglican Church.  But overall it is a reasonable rating.  I can’t speak for the rating for other denominations but I sure there is similar variation within each denomination similar.

The thing that strikes me as I look at the chart is the diversity that has developed in the way we humans can decide to worship our God or gods.  We all believe we have basically the correct understanding of whom and what God is and the way God should be worshiped.  This is true for atheists who have their own god in my view (I leaned in grade 9 math that even a null set is a sub set of a factor) i.e. even non-belief is belief in something.

I am not absolutely certain of many things about God but I am sure that Jesus Christ did not have any idea, despite being fully divine (I’m not absolutely certain about that), that what he started would end up where it is today.  Being a good Jew he likely did not anticipate there being a new Religion named after him or at least after his title of Christ. 

I believe if we are to be at all true to what Jesus wants us to be we must focus on the root of who we are as Christians which is Jesus Christ.  If we all have this in common we should not worry so much about the differences in doctrine and liturgy.  That being said I am glad I have found the “one true faith” of Anglicanism which can worship God along with the other true Christian faiths. 

 To all my brothers and sisters in Christ have a blessed Holy Week and Great Triduum.