My church started its Fall Bible study yesterday. We're going through A Fragile Stone, Peter: Jesus' Friend.
I'm
having a hard time writing today. Maybe it's because I'm tired after
seeing Barack Obama do so poorly in last night's debate. I myself feel
rather listless right now. And, when that is the case, trying to say
everything exactly right becomes a challenge. So I'll grant
myself some leeway in this post and just write what comes to my mind,
whether or not it makes sense or is completely fair and accurate. It will probably be like Painter Smurf splashing paint on his canvas and calling that art!
I've
been having positive thoughts about Jesus lately. One reason is that I
listened to that Mark Driscoll sermon on Esther a few days ago----in
which Driscoll presents Jesus as a benevolent king----and I was drawn to
that picture of Jesus. Then, last night at Bible study, I was thumbing
through our course book, and there was a part of it in which Michael
Card (who is the author, sort of) is said to have stated on the DVD that
he feels more drawn to worship Jesus when he reads that Jesus served
his disciples breakfast, than he'd feel if Jesus were surrounded by a
host of angels. That's pretty powerful, isn't it? Jesus the
servant. It's an elementary concept, but one that I'm happy to be
reminded of as I go through this Bible study.
It's
tempting to embrace some form of emotional evangelicalism----one that
accepts without ambiguity that Jesus was the Messiah and that the Hebrew
Bible points to him, one that views the Bible as without error, one
that seeks to harmonize biblical contradictions, etc. As I was thinking
about this last night, my mind wandered to how evangelical preachers I
heard tried to explain the difference between a guilt offering and a sin
offering in the Book of Leviticus. I don't remember exactly what they
said, but I remembered that, when I first heard their explanation, it
sounded to me like a stretch----that it wasn't based on anything
explicit in the text itself. I wondered if embracing an
emotional evangelicalism would essentially require me to check my brain
at the door----to disregard that the writings of the Hebrew Bible are
diverse and reflect their historical contexts, in many cases overlapping
with ancient Near Eastern culture. But then I thought about the
importance of sticking with the text. I don't have to try to reconcile
the text with some faith conviction about it. I should just let the text be the text. But that is emotionally drier than inhabiting the world of emotional evangelicalism.
But then here's where things get tricky. The text often is not explicit. We were sensitized to that last night at Bible study. The
curriculum was asking us how we thought Peter felt when such-and-such
happened. The fact is, however, that we're not told how Peter felt.
I'd say it's fun to speculate, but one lady in the group seemed to
think that it was idle to speculate about what we're not told
explicitly.
But, in many cases, we almost have to speculate to get anywhere with the text, or to do anything with it.
For example, after Jesus in Luke 5 performed a miracle in which Peter
caught a whole bunch of fish, Peter asked Jesus to depart from him, for
Peter was a sinful man. Why? We're not told explicitly. And so we
went through different possibilities. Michael Card's explanation was
rather elliptical: he said that Peter was afraid of unlimited success,
and so Jesus responded to that concern by telling Peter that Peter would
be a fisher of men. Say what? Was Card suggesting that Peter
feared that success would corrupt him----perhaps make him proud----and
so Jesus was proposing service as a solution to that? I'm not sure.
Someone in the group made the suggestion that Peter was afraid of
having access to that much power, for Peter feared that he would misuse
it. And the curriculum also suggested that Peter felt grossly
inadequate in the face of the divine----and I'd say that this does not
necessarily mean that Peter at that moment regarded Jesus as God, but
Peter could have recognized that Jesus was part of the work of God, and
Peter was in the presence of that when Jesus did the miracle. I thought that the group's speculation over this question was rather fruitful. It's good to have ambiguity, because that makes discussions possible. But it was speculation. And yet, I'd say that there are some speculations that are better than others. For
example, saying that Peter felt inadequate in the face of the divine
makes sense, for there are plenty of times in the Hebrew Bible in which
people feel inadequate before the divine. Luke could be drawing from
that motif.
Here's an area in which my warm feelings
about Jesus conflicted with my scholarly reading of the text: We were
asked in the curriculum if we were willing to die to self and take up
our cross and follow Jesus. I checked that passage, and it was talking
about martyrdom, then there followed the passage in which Jesus told his
disciples that some standing there wouldn't taste death until they saw
the Son of Man coming in his kingdom. First of all, I wondered how that
text could even be applicable to us, since we're not in danger of
martyrdom----at least not where we are sitting (and I'm talking about
those of us in that group, and probably most Christians in the United
States). But I did not ask that question out loud. Second, I was
reminded of the whole problem of imminent eschatology----Jesus appears
to predict that the end was near, but the problem with that is that it's
two thousand years later, and world paradise still has not come. And
third, I was reminded that, yes, there is the nice, warm Jesus in the
Gospels, and yet there's also the fierce apocalyptic Jesus, who somewhat
scares me. Can I get over my aversions to Jesus in the synoptic
Gospels?
In any case, this will probably be a thought-provoking study. We'll see how it turns out!