What About the Spirit?

A Guest post by the Revd Ron Keynes.

Shoot me down if you like, but I have quite some difficulty with much of how some Christians understand the Spirit of God. There are rather too many who somehow manage to ‘make God in their own image,’ and require others to bow the knee to their views and aspirations. I guess that tends to be the nature of ‘religion,’ which is where and why I tend to part company with ‘religion’. Not the Faith, to be sure, but ‘religion.’ However, if you think I go too far, all I ask is that you think about what follows. You may like to compare this approach with that of a certain Jesus of Nazareth. He rarely required ‘belief’ though He often challenged people to think and then to choose.

Like so many other older people, I was brought up in an atmosphere of ‘shut up and believe’ – and to question one’s elders and betters was tantamount to heresy. Those were the days of the ‘Holy Ghost’ which tended to set the agenda anyhow. But look back over Scripture, if you will, or, better still, ponder your own pilgrimage as a person let alone as a Christian, and ponder a little deeper.

If ever you wonder how many other ‘Abrahams’ that God called, you will gather what I am on about. The real Abraham did not follow because he understood right away that Yahweh was touching him on the shoulder. If the truth is known, it was more likely to be a sense of dissatisfaction with the religion of his time and day, there in the valley of the Euphrates River. He sensed the need to go searching after more real and tangible truth, for his moon worshipping had left him somewhat out in the cold. And it was no narrow direction he was heading, but a far more fascinating and even risky one. And if he – or someone else – had not taken that journey, it is interesting to wonder where we would be now.

My real point is that rather too many Christians have reduced the powerful and relevant story of the Spirit of God, limiting the impact to ‘those who believe.’ The reality is otherwise, and it seems to me that our present age and stage is not a bad time to underline that fact. For the coming of the Holy Spirit is not so much a narrow religious experience, as it is a fundamental challenge to all of humanity to be like Abraham, and that is to search for truth in whatever area of life, and to follow wherever that search takes us. In Biblical terms, the Spirit is the Spirit of truth, and surely the rather wonderful and broad picture of the Spirit’s activity in the Acts of the Apostles is that He was at work in the most unexpected of people. Sure, the Apostles were affected, but so were that Roman centurion and the Ethiopian eunuch. In conventional terms, those men had no place whatever in the New Creation.

So the challenge that Christian Faith offers to all humans of all ages is to be open to and to respond honestly to truth in whatever situation one finds oneself. Perhaps this position has been reached – from my perspective – because in our cultural heritage, conscience has always been held in the highest esteem. That does not mean that mistakes, sometimes monumental, have been made. But it does mean something rather more significant.

First is, that this search for truth – and balance in all situations and confrontations – is the only way forward in any human society or culture. There are illustrations absolutely abounding of the truth of the opposite, are there not!!! When I am unsure of your veracity and/or integrity, then life becomes really quite tenuous. And right here lies the very basis of the Christian contribution to life, pointing to reconciliation and away from disintegration.

And the second is that, unless a person or people are so degraded as to have silenced their conscience - and really have to be aware of that fact - the veracity of this human experience is available to all humans, regardless of time, culture or history. So, for heaven's sake, release the Spirit from bondage!

Love is Our True Destiny

Love is our true destiny. We do not find the meaning of life by ourselves alone – we find it with another. We do not discover the secret of our lives merely by study and calculation in our own isolated meditations. The meaning of our life is a secret that has to be revealed to us in love, by the one we love. And if this love is unreal, the secret will not be found, the meaning will never reveal itself, the message will never be decoded. At best, we will receive a scrambled and partial message, one that will deceive and confuse us. We will never be fully real until we let ourselves fall in love – either with another human person or with God. Thomas Merton

The Theological meaning of Ascension

To extend a previous post, the theological meaning of the ascension of Jesus can be summarised as: (a) Jesus has the authority of God (so listen to him!) (b) Because Jesus reigns with the Father, when the Father sends the Spirit it is impregnated with the crucified-risen one. Because of the ascension Jesus is no longer bound to a single geographical/chronological dot, but is universally present as saviour to the whole of the creation, continuously.

There are many consequences flowing from this theological meaning. Two for starters. First, stardust is now resurrected and ascended; the beginning of the fulfilment of all stardust has begun. Second, everything that is encapsulated in the terms 'crucified-risen' is now present to all creation, including both the absence (and mysterious presence) of God in the godforsakenness of the cross, and the liberation of the victory of resurrection.

Ascension and Metaphor

Part of the trick of reading the Bible is knowing what to read literally. The ascension, if by that we mean Luke's picture of Jesus zooming off on a cloud and on this cloud reaching heaven, is a case in point. It is not necessary to believe this happened literally. Ascension, like resurrection, is on the edge of history as we usually think of it. The resurrection and ascension are history-like in the narratives, but are not of the same historical character as the crucifixion. This is not meant as a way to wriggle out of the bodily resurrection and ascension of Jesus. Rather, it is to recognise that resurrection (and ascension) is beyond our usual experience. Like the resurrection of Jesus, the account of the ascension tries to communicate what is beyond our usual experience with language and experiences within our grasp. Resurrection is like becoming alive again (the resuscitation of Lazarus as a symbol of resurrection); resurrection is not literally coming back to life, it is a new and transformed existence. So too the story in Luke-Acts of the ascension of Jesus. It is like he was lifted up, but not exactly. God is 'up there', but not literally. God is within us, but not literally. Jesus really is raised and ascended; he departed 'on a cloud' in the same way that he 'came back to life' like Lazarus.

Our Only Hope

"Easter is surely the ground of hope for human beings and the cosmos rather than an example of life's self-perpetuation; for it identifies God, and God alone, as the one who makes death's defeat possible, and gives new existence to the terminated. (Rom 4:17) Jesus was dead and buried; his life was finished and done with. No rhythm of nature, no innate capacity of humanness, could return him from the grave. Only God's grace and power, accomplishing a new act with and upon a man totally deceased, could win that victory." (Alan E. Lewis)

Domesticating the Death and Resurrection of Jesus

The shocking nature of the death and resurrection of Jesus leads to the temptation of domesticating its impact. A popular method in this regard is making his death and resurrection one more example or expression (no matter how important) of an inner spiritual principle, historical process, or cycle of nature. Using cocoons as a metaphor for the death and resurrection, while of some use perhaps with the kids, has the effect of making his death and resurrection understandable. And it is a short step from this to the resurrection of Jesus becoming the metaphor of a natural human capacity, inherent within each and every one of us. Accompanying this move is the superficial acceptance of death as the door we must go through, or something of that kind. None of this takes into account the finality of death, the annihilation of Jesus' identity and God on the cross, and the revolution in thinking that the resurrection of this Jesus brings.

In a similar way there is the temptation to make the dying and rising Jesus a symbol of a great historical process within history itself. Again, just too easy. A little more difficult to avoid is the spiritual 'law' of death and resurrection. While the dying and rising Jesus is a the model of a lives now, Jesus' death and resurrection is not an example of this spiritual principle. If there is a spiritual principle, Jesus is it. (The same applies to making the dying and rising of Jesus an expression of the nature of the trinitarian God. This is all well and good, except that he is not an expression of it, but is it.) and once we make Jesus' death and resurrection the principle which we follow, it becomes a lot more scarier, with the sting of death truly to be confronted, and the despair of the cross a reality not easily glossed over.

The Resurrection and History

For a number of reasons people miss the continuity in the New Testament narrative between the pre- and post-resurrected Christ. The New Testament does not make the appearances of the risen Jesus any less historical than the ministry of the pre-risen Jesus. For sceptics the constrast in the pre-/post- resurrected narrative is between history (no matter if exact details of the ministry of Jesus are disputed) and the non-historical resurrection appearances. This leads to all kinds of psychological/spiritual explanations of the appearances of the resurrected Jesus. I can't see it in the text myself, and seems to me an alien preconception forced onto the text. The resurrection appearances as narrated in the New Testament are to be thought of as history-like. (e.g. Ac 2:23-24)

Does the New Testament encourage us to entertain a contrast within the story of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus? Yes, and it revolves around the enormity of the rejection of Jesus, and specifically his desolation on the cross. The God before the cross is not possible to believe in. The Father delivered up the Son; in reality, and this is deeply shocking, even to Jesus himself. Who is the resurrected Christ and the God who raised him? is belief even possible after the cross? If the resurrection is not merely the cancellation of the cross, but includes it (remembering that resurrection has nail holes in it), who is God? The answer to that question makes Christianity possible, and stands in contrast to ordinary religion. this is the contrast the new Testament is asking of us.

The Irony of 'Liberal' Theology

One of the ironies of the "liberal" wing of the church is that when it theologises it jettisons Christianity's best resources to achieve what it wants! The identity of Jesus is a good example. In reaction to smug and conservative Christianity 'liberal' theology reduces the messianic self-knowledge of Jesus, making him the prophet who delivers the message, rather than the message itself. It appears to me a kind of visceral counter-reaction to the misuse of the titles of Jesus by conservative forces. But retaining the messianic self-consciousness of Jesus radicalizes Jesus, uniting him even more fully with the downtrodden of history and sinners than "liberal" theology's great prophet.

Two examples of what I mean. First, if Jesus is 'Son of God' in a unique way, bringing the presence of God's reign in his very person, indeed, if he is God's very own flesh, then Jesus' option for the poor and sinner is a stinging critique of the forces of death, oppression and ordinary religion. "Liberal" theology emphasises the solidarity of Jesus with the underside of history; retaining his titles radicalises the solidarity we see in his teaching, ministry and death.

Second, 'liberal' theology attempts to maintain the deep shock of the cross to ordinary religion, and emphasise the solidarity of the crucified Jesus with all the crosses of history. Exactly right, except that by retaining the titles of Jesus and his self-conscious knowledge of them the rupture of the cross is deepened not removed. This Jesus, who has relied upon and utterly defined himself in terms of his filial relationship, is abandoned. That's the end of ordinary religion's god.

Cross and Tomb: Who is Jesus?

The scandal of the cross and tomb of Jesus is the annihilation of his personal identity. Despite the contention that Jesus made no claims about himself, but preached the kingdom alone, the words and actions of the Jesus of all four Gospels are woven into his personal identity. John's Gospel is explicit int his regard; the other three at times explicit, but often more implicit or elliptical. The death of Jesus is the failure of his kingdom project; the God of love and forgiveness, the loving Father of the Son, has abandoned Jesus, or perhaps never existed int he firs place. The scandalous death of Jesus makes either possible, perhaps even likely. And with the failure of his kingdom project, so too the personal identity of Jesus disappears when his corpse is placed in the tomb. The most poignant and terrible contrast in the death of Jesus is not between his innocence and the sin of those who betrayed, deserted, scourged, mocked and killed him, but between the claims Jesus made regarding his relationship to God, and his ignoble end. The cry of dereliction from Jesus on the cross, "My God, my God, why have you deserted me?" is Jesus himself questioning his personal identity, and therefore, his whole life, including its purpose and meaning.

Let's stay with this a while longer. What if the cry of dereliction, rather than only being an expression of how he feels, expresses actual abandonment? This is difficult, and it lies at the beginning of the doctrine of the Trinity, and all the theologies of atonement that in someway try to take seriously the abandonment of Jesus for our sins. Could this be possible? Could God abandon Jesus? Is he truly at one with all the godforsaken of history? Indeed, actually abandoned, and therefore untied with those estranged from God by their own sin and wickedness? Is he not just a victim of sin, but also, in the sense above, a sinner? Yes. And the resurrection is not the cancellation of the scandal of the Father's abandonment of the Son. Knowledge of the resurrection only intensifies the question about the identity of the crucified one, and more importantly, the nature of God and God's relationship to creation.