I am preaching this Sunday night at North Beach Baptist on Revelation chapter 2, so I have been doing some reflection on who we are as the church.

I’m thinking that if the church is really the bride of Christ… then logically that would make God my father-in-law rather than my father… right?…

Maybe this would also explain why the Holy Spirit keeps nagging me…

Some excellent clarity of thought here. I post it as much for my own future reference as for your enjoyment.

“There is no agreement in the church today about what happens to people when they die. Yet the New Testament is crystal clear on the matter: In a classic passage, Paul speaks of “the redemption of our bodies” (Rom. 8:23). There is no room for doubt as to what he means: God’s people are promised a new type of bodily existence, the fulfillment and redemption of our present bodily life. The rest of the early Christian writings, where they address the subject, are completely in tune with this.

The traditional picture of people going to either heaven or hell as a one-stage, postmortem journey represents a serious distortion and diminution of the Christian hope. Bodily resurrection is not just one odd bit of that hope. It is the element that gives shape and meaning to the rest of the story of God’s ultimate purposes. If we squeeze it to the margins, as many have done by implication, or indeed, if we leave it out altogether, as some have done quite explicitly, we don’t just lose an extra feature, like buying a car that happens not to have electrically operated mirrors. We lose the central engine, which drives it and gives every other component its reason for working.

When we talk with biblical precision about the resurrection, we discover an excellent foundation for lively and creative Christian work in the present world—not, as some suppose, for an escapist or quietist piety.

Bodily Resurrection

While both Greco-Roman paganism and Second Temple Judaism held a wide variety of beliefs about life beyond death, the early Christians, beginning with Paul, were remarkably unanimous on the topic.

When Paul speaks in Philippians 3 of being “citizens of heaven,” he doesn’t mean that we shall retire there when we have finished our work here. He says in the next line that Jesus will come from heaven in order to transform the present humble body into a glorious body like his own. Jesus will do this by the power through which he makes all things subject to himself. This little statement contains in a nutshell more or less all Paul’s thought on the subject. The risen Jesus is both the model for the Christian’s future body and the means by which it comes.

Similarly, in Colossians 3:1–4, Paul says that when the Messiah (the one “who is your life”) appears, then you too will appear with him in glory. Paul does not say “one day you will go to be with him.” No, you already possess life in him. This new life, which the Christian possesses secretly, invisible to the world, will burst forth into full bodily reality and visibility.

The clearest and strongest passage is Romans 8:9–11. If the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Jesus the Messiah, dwells in you, says Paul, then the one who raised the Messiah from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies as well, through his Spirit who dwells in you. God will give life, not to a disembodied spirit, not to what many people have thought of as a spiritual body in the sense of a nonphysical one, but “to your mortal bodies also.”

Other New Testament writers support this view. The first letter of John declares that when Jesus appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. The resurrection body of Jesus, which at the moment is almost unimaginable to us in its glory and power, will be the model for our own. And of course within John’s gospel, despite the puzzlement of those who want to read the book in a very different way, we have some of the clearest statements of future bodily resurrection. Jesus reaffirms the widespread Jewish expectation of resurrection in the last day, and announces that the hour for this has already arrived. It is quite explicit: “The hour is coming,” he says, “indeed, it is already here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of Man, and those who hear will live; when all in the graves will come out, those who have done good, to the resurrection of life, and those who have done evil, to the resurrection of judgment.”

Here we must discuss what Jesus means when he declares that there are “many dwelling places” in his Father’s house. This has regularly been taken, not least when used in the context of bereavement, to mean that the dead (or at least dead Christians) will simply go to heaven permanently rather than being raised again subsequently to new bodily life. But the word for “dwelling places” here, monai, is regularly used in ancient Greek not for a final resting place, but for a temporary halt on a journey that will take you somewhere else in the long run.

This fits closely with Jesus’ words to the dying brigand in Luke: “Today you will be with me in paradise.” Despite a long tradition of misreading, paradise here means not a final destination but the blissful garden, the parkland of rest and tranquility, where the dead are refreshed as they await the dawn of the new day. The main point of the sentence lies in the apparent contrast between the brigand’s request and Jesus’ reply: “Remember me,” he says, “when you come in your kingdom,” implying that this will be at some far distant future. Jesus’ answer brings this future hope into the present, implying of course that with his death the kingdom is indeed coming, even though it doesn’t look like what anyone had imagined: “Today you will be with me in paradise.” There will, of course, still be a future completion involving ultimate resurrection; Luke’s overall theological understanding leaves no doubt on that score. Jesus, after all, didn’t rise again “today,” that is, on Good Friday. Luke must have understood him to be referring to a state of being-in-paradise. With Jesus, the future hope has come forward into the present. For those who die in faith, before that final reawakening, the central promise is of being “with Jesus” at once. “My desire is to depart,” wrote Paul, “and be with Christ, which is far better.”

Resurrection itself then appears as what the word always meant in the ancient world. It wasn’t a way of talking about life after death. It was a way of talking about a new bodily life after whatever state of existence one might enter immediately upon death. It was, in other words, life after life after death.

What then about such passages as 1 Peter 1, which speaks of a salvation that is “kept in heaven for you” so that in your present believing you are receiving “the salvation of your souls”? Here, I suggest, the automatic assumption of Western Christianity leads us badly astray. Most Christians today, reading a passage like this, assume that it means that heaven is where you go to receive this salvation—or even that salvation consists in “going to heaven when you die.” The way we now understand that language in the Western world is totally different from what Jesus and his hearers meant and understood.

For a start, heaven is actually a reverent way of speaking about God, so that “riches in heaven” simply means “riches in God’s presence.” But then, by derivation from this primary meaning, heaven is the place where God’s purposes for the future are stored up. It isn’t where they are meant to stay so that one would need to go to heaven to enjoy them. It is where they are kept safe against the day when they will become a reality on earth. God’s future inheritance, the incorruptible new world and the new bodies that are to inhabit that world, are already kept safe, waiting for us, so that they can be brought to birth in the new heavens and new earth.

The mission of the church is nothing more or less than the outworking, in the power of the Spirit, of Jesus’ bodily resurrection. It is the anticipation of the time when God will fill the earth with his glory, transform the old heavens and earth into the new, and raise his children from the dead to populate and rule over the redeemed world he has made.

If that is so, mission must urgently recover from its long-term schizophrenia. The split between saving souls and doing good in the world is not a product of the Bible or the gospel, but of the cultural captivity of both. The world of space, time, and matter is where real people live, where real communities happen, where difficult decisions are made, where schools and hospitals bear witness to the “now, already” of the gospel while police and prisons bear witness to the “not yet.” The world of space, time, and matter is where parliaments, city councils, neighborhood watch groups, and everything in between are set up and run for the benefit of the wider community, the community where anarchy means that bullies (economic and social as well as physical) will always win, where the weak and vulnerable will always need protecting, and where the social and political structures of society are part of the Creator’s design.

And the church that is renewed by the message of Jesus’ resurrection must be the church that goes to work precisely in that space, time, and matter. The church claims this world in advance as the place of God’s kingdom, of Jesus’ lordship, and of the Spirit’s power. Councils and parliaments can and often do act wisely, though they will always need scrutiny and accountability, because they in turn may become agents of bullying and corruption.

Thus the church that takes sacred space seriously (not as a retreat from the world but as a bridgehead into it) will go straight from worshiping in the sanctuary to debating in the council chamber; to discussing matters of town planning, of harmonizing and humanizing beauty in architecture, green spaces, and road traffic schemes; and to environmental work, creative and healthy farming methods, and proper use of resources. If it is true, as I have argued, that the whole world is now God’s holy land, we must not rest as long as that land is spoiled and defaced. This is not an extra to the church’s mission. It is central.

The church that takes seriously the fact that Jesus is Lord of all will not just celebrate quietly every time we write the date on a letter or document, will not just set aside Sunday as far as humanly and socially possible as a celebration of God’s new creation, will not just seek to order its own life in an appropriate rhythm of worship and work. Such a church will also seek to bring wisdom to the rhythms of work in offices and shops, in local government, in civic holidays, and in the shaping of public life. These things cannot be taken for granted. The enormous shifts during my lifetime, from the whole town observing Good Friday and Easter, to those great days being simply more occasions for football matches and yet more televised reruns of old movies, are indices of what happens when a society loses its roots and drifts with prevailing social currents. The reclaiming of time as God’s good gift (as opposed to time as simply a commodity to be spent for one’s own benefit, which often means fresh forms of slavery for others) is not an extra to the church’s mission. It is central.

One of the things I most enjoy about being a bishop is watching ordinary Christians (not that there are any “ordinary” Christians, but you know what I mean) going straight from worshiping Jesus in church to making a radical difference in the material lives of people down the street by running playgroups for children of single working moms; by organizing credit unions to help people at the bottom of the financial ladder find their way to responsible solvency; by campaigning for better housing, against dangerous roads, for drug rehab centers, for wise laws relating to alcohol, for decent library and sporting facilities, for a thousand other things in which God’s sovereign rule extends to hard, concrete reality. Once again, all this is not an extra to the mission of the church. It is central.

This way of coming at the tasks of the church in terms of space, time, and matter leads directly to evangelism. When the church is seen to move straight from worship of God to affecting much-needed change in the world; when it becomes clear that the people who feast at Jesus’ table are the ones at the forefront of work to eliminate hunger and famine; when people realize that those who pray for the Spirit to work in and through them are the people who seem to have extra resources of love and patience in caring for those whose lives are damaged, bruised, and shamed—then it is natural for people to recognize that something is going on that they want to be part of.

No single individual can attempt more than a fraction of this mission. That’s why mission is the work of the whole church, the whole time. Paul’s advice to the Philippians—even though he and they knew they were suffering for their faith and might be tempted to retreat from the world into a dualistic, sectarian mentality—was upbeat. “These are the things you should think through,” he wrote: “whatever is true, whatever is holy, whatever is upright, whatever is pure, whatever is attractive, whatever has a good reputation; anything virtuous, anything praiseworthy.” And in thinking through these things, we will discover more and more about the same Creator God whom we know in and through Jesus Christ and will be better equipped to work effectively not over against the world, but with the grain of all goodwill, of all that seeks to bring and enhance life.”

N. T. Wright excerpt from Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church

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It seems a pretty standard trait of almost every church I’ve been a part of (including Upstream) that when it comes to praying in a group, we almost always ‘share’ what’s going on (talk about it) and then when everyone’s had a turn we pray about it.

I have often wondered if the ‘sharing’ isn’t actually the prayer and I have always felt a little weird telling God the stuff he just heard when he was present with us in the conversation.

Its almost as if we behave like he’s not in the room until we are officially praying.

And yet because of my long history of prayer in this form I would feel like I hadn’t ‘prayed’ if we just talked. Maybe this is something I need to unlearn?…

What do you think?

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I was meeting with Cameron today, one of our Forge interns and we were discussing some theological stuff.

He asked what Jesus meant in John 20, the part bolded:

John 20: 21Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.” 22And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. 23 If you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.”

I don’t have a great answer.

How about you?

If I forgive someone’s sins are they then forgiven by God?..

If I choose not to forgive are their sins then not forgiven?…

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I don’t think I actually know anyone who would sign up to the nonsense called prosperity gospel. It is an extreme abberation of biblical teaching suggesting that Jesus will make us happy, prosperous and all will be well.

I happened across this clip today on Purgatorio where John Piper takes it in a totally opposite direction. As I watched it I couldn’t help wondering if in his attempt to communicate an important message, Piper hasn’t jumped to the other extreme…

What do you reckon?

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Then what else might we need to re-consider?…

NT Wright debunks the myth that you go to heaven after death and it is the ultimate reality. Try preaching that on Sunday…

I was in a church recently where the pastor did. As I wandered in the crowd afterwards a few people expressed concern at the wayward sermon.

It does make you wonder though… if were wrong about heaven…

I guess he has puzzled me for a while.

Maybe that’s an understatement. As I mentioned previously I have started again reading thru the Bible and thankfully Leviticus is over… but now I’m into the book of Numbers.

If I have noticed one thing repeatedly this time thru it is the harsh way God seems to deal with his people. I understand the ‘holiness of God’ (or maybe I don’t…) but he does seem to punish disproportionate to the offense on several occasions.

Today I was reading about Moses hitting the rock to bring out water rather than just talking to it. For that offense he and Aaron were denied entry to the promised land. I guess if I were offering God some advice I’d be saying ‘Chill out a bit mate. Give him a wedgie or something, but this bloke has consistently done the right thing in the face of some pretty tough opposition at times and because he stuffs up here you are going take away what he has been working towards for so long?!’

It makes me reflect on why I believe in this God and live as he calls me to. And as I do that I realise my faith goes well beyond reason. I used to think I was a Christian because it made sense – the ‘numbers added up’ – but increasingly I can see that the numbers add up in some ways but not others.

Pure reason (as if there is such a thing) is not sufficient to either accept or reject faith.

These incidents do not lead me to a place of dumping faith – there has been too much experience of God to consider that – but they do perplex me and disturb me.

In my younger years I would have found a reason to explain why God did some of these bizarre things. There was always a reason if you read the right books. Increasingly I find those answers dissatisfying – often simplistic and offensive – and I think I would rather just live with the fact that there is much about God that I just don’t get. Maybe I will never get. Oddly enough as I get older I am also more comfortable with this also.

Just some morning thoughts from Numbers 20 as I ponder again ‘what was that all about?’

So how do others deal with God’s at times bizarre personality?

Is it simply that I really don’t ‘get’ holiness or is he more odd than we choose to admit sometimes?

And if he is why do you still follow?…

My long time friend in Denver, James, writes of the importance of the church communities we are a part of. He says, “I am convinced that we are creatures that are shaped by the communities we give ourselves to.”

I couldn’t agree more. The group of people we choose to align ourselves with will give form to our identity and when it comes to a faith context the church we choose to be a part of will play a significant influence in our own formation. This is not rocket science of course, but it does have significant implications for how we choose which ‘church’ to a part of.

James writes:”I believe at a very deep level that I need church if I want to be a faithful follower of Jesus. But I do not think it is wise to participate in a community of faith that simply reinforces the scripts of the dominant culture.”

Now therein lies the tension.

How do we participate in communities that actually choose to live counter-culturally and in critique of the dominant framework?

We have taken this as our primary motif (‘Upstream’) and find ourselves in a place of constant tension in this regard. We are as human and as prone to selfish indulgence as anyone else, but we want to challenge one another to live differently, yet with a spirit of grace. I think its a healthy place to live, but I am aware that for many this is not even on the radar.

I was asked recently if I know any ‘good’ churches in the area. (The person asking put ‘good’ in inverted commas)

I had to reply “that depends on what you mean by ‘good'”

If ‘good’ = catering to your personal wish list then that is very different to where ‘good’ = a community that will call me and challenge me to live in a Christlike way.

For many the dominant questions when picking a church are related to the music, the kids and youth ministries and the interest level of the preaching. Is it any wonder we find ourselves in the malaise we are currently in?

As I have said before we can only be disciples in community so this question of alignment cannot be overrated.

This needs to be balanced with the very real acknowledgement that we do have needs. The person asking me the question has a teenage son, so while I believe ours is a ‘good’ church I am not sure it would be a suitable church for him and his family as he may wish for his son to have a larger peer group.

So here is my first theological reflection for a long time! Any thoughts?…

Ethics is complicated I reckon.

Lying, killing, stealing are all off limits in the big 10 and for good reason.

But this morning as I was reading Exodus Ch 1 I read the story of the Egyptian midwives who refused to kill the Hebrew babies and then told Pharaoh it was because the Hebrew women were too quick in childbirth… Sounds like a porky to me!!

Then verse 20 says that God was kind to them because of this.

Or you could take the case of Rahab who hid the spies and lied about having them in her home. When it all hits the fan she gets out alive… because she lied… to protect the spies.

Does God have one rule for some and another for others?

I remember my mother in law told me of a simulation game she was part of to help people understand the implications of dire poverty. She was faced with the choice of ‘let my baby starve to death or enter prostitution to survive’…

So much of life is the lesser of two evils or the doing of what would usually be bad to achieve what is good.

I think its why ‘black and white’ people leave me so cold.

Life is much more complicated than that.