The Two Best Ways To Live (Kids' Talk)

Following on from the ten commandments as great ways to live, we have now the 2 greatest ways to live.

Remember when we talked about the 10 great ways to live? Can anyone remember any of them?

Hard isn't it? There are so many. But Jesus taught us a way to remember the ten. He noticed that the first four are about God, and the last 6 are about other people. So he made the 10 great ways to live into 2 greatest ways to live: Love God with everything you are, and love yur neighbour as yourself.

[If you want to impress everyone you can use this distinction between the first 4 and the last 6 as a mnemonic device to remember the 10 pretty easily.]

The Freedom of God's Covenant With Israel

In a previous post I mentioned that in the story of Exodus 32 God's action is not determined by human behaviour, particularly human failure. This corresponds to the free initiative of God in choosing Israel in the first place. God chose Israel not because of its power or righteousness, but out of love. (See Deut 7:7-8) And because God's free choice of love was not determined by Israel's standing, to then break the covenant by destroying the people because of their abhorrent failure would be a denial of God's freedom. In the same way that God chose Israel not for any reason inherent in Israel (that is, God's action was not conditional upon certain human behaviour), so too God can, in God's freedom, bring a surprising word of forgiveness into the cul-de-sac of human failure. This foundation of the covenant upon the freedom of God also corresponds with the purpose of God's election: our participation in the freedom of God. (See Rom 8:21)

All of this continues seamlessly in the story of Jesus, particularly his crucifixion. The cross of Jesus is a low point in the history of human failure, but it becomes the means for a new and final word of forgiveness for all.

For Pentecost 22(A)
See Hans Urs von Balthasar, Engagement With God, pp. 13-18.

God is Faithful to the Covenant

Questions about the historicity of the flood shouldn't cloud the point of the story of the flood and of Noah and the covenant. The point is the contrast between God's attempted destruction of all living things because of the continual evil of the human heart (6:5) with God's recognition that this is not the way to deal with that evil. (See 8:21-22; 9:8-17) This is preparatory to the calling of Abraham and Sarah as God's response to the evil of the human heart, leading to the new covenant prophesied by Jeremiah and others (Jer 31:31-34) fulfilled in Jesus (Matt 26:26-29). I don't take the Genesis story to mean that God had to learn this. The story is a literary device to make the point; and it does so effectively. And it is not difficult to see this, especially given the function of Genesis 1-11. Incidentally, this story also criticizes human beings,, for we have not learned that killing off the 'evil ones' will not magically bring righteousness.

We meet something similar in Genesis 18 and Exodus 32. In these stories Abraham and Moses respectively convince God that destroying people is not necessarily the best thing to do, and frankly questionable considering the kind of God God is. Some people are tempted to read this as literally true, which makes God needing to be persuaded. (Or at best a test of Abraham and Moses). Whether these stories have some more ancient source and began their life with such an interpretation, this is not how they function in the Bible now. They are, again, literary devices highlighting that, even under extremis God is just and merciful (Gen 18) and faithful to the covenant (Exod 32). In the latter case, it is the covenant that is more important than the sin itself, and God acts on sin, not the other way around. This comes directly out of the source of the covenant, but more on that later.

For further discussion of this point see Rowan Williams, Tokens of Trust, pp. 17-19, or point 12 in my Chapter 1 study notes.

For Pentecost 22(A)

The Ten Commandments (Kids' Talk)

For a good, usable version for kids of the 10 commandments, see here.

A simple kid's talk: Who has heard of the 10 commandments? Can you name any of them? [Then put them on the screen and go through them.] The point of the commandments is to tell us who we are.

For example, We tell the truth. When we tell the truth people can trust us, and we want to be a church that people can trust. When we tell lies, people can't trust us because they don't know whether we are lying or telling the truth. Imagine if we lied all the time. What would it be like? No good, because you could never trust anyone. That's not who we are: we tell the truth, and we tell the truth to be trustworthy.

God gives us commandments for us to obey so that we can be the kind of people God wants.

The Ten Commandments

There are (at least) two ways of looking at the 'rules' of Christianity, which include those we inherited direct from the Old Testament. Despite all the dangers of legalism, the first is to see them as rules to be obeyed. Now, there is something in this of course. But I am more interested in the alternative. This is to see the 'rules' like the ten commandments as the expressions, very practical expressions at that, of our life together, and of the kind of (Christian) community we wish to be. In the case of the ten commandments, lying and stealing will not lead us into the kind of mutuality that the gospel calls us to. This line of thinking makes context important and does not ignore the place of personal character and virtue. This kind of thinking is compatible with the idea of revelation, but not the kind of theology that thinks the 'rules' just dropped out of heaven.

I am persuaded that this is exactly how the 'rules' function in the church. However, I am a little suspicious all the same. Following this line of thought, it could be a little too easy to dismiss the 'rules' and start again. That is, it would be possible for someone to say that they understand the kind of community we are independent of the existing 'rules'. Under the pretext of changing contexts, they could then rewrite the 'rules' to suit their particular understanding of the Christian community. We should remember, however, that the 'rules' are an expression of the community, so therefore a good way of understanding what it means to be Christian community is to start with the 'rules' and follow them back to the kind of community that produced them in the first place. I think there is a great deal to be said for the latter methodology in becoming Christian, despite my utter abhorrence of legalism.

However, I still think the 'rules' are an expression of the community, and therefore, once members have lived in that community from the inside, and followed the rules backwards (so to speak) to that community, it is possible for the 'rules' to be modified by the community.

The good life is not simply one in which certain rules are kept - this is always at best a shorthand for the results of life together in the Body. The good life is one in which we have learned how to be for each other, and in so being to live fully as ourselves. If lying, killing, adultery, greed and so on are sinful, it is because we couldn't imagine a community , such as the Body of Christ is meant to be, in which things like this went unchallenged. (Rowan Williams, Tokens of Trust, p. 110)

[Pentecost 21(A), Exodus 20:1-4, 7-9, 12-20]

The Mother of All Biblical Metaphors!

The Exodus with its elements of slavery, passover and redemption, and following this, the narrative of desert, covenant, rebellion and promised land, is one of the dominant interpretive lenses of the Bible. An immense amount of Scripture is refracted through this narrative. Not only this, it is the pivot on which the whole of the biblical story moves. Prior to it we have Genesis 1-11, outlining to us the universal predicament of human kind. God's response to this predicament is to bring redemption, and this begins with the call of Abraham and Sarah, leading (eventually) to the slavery of the people of Israel in Egypt. And then, after the Exodus and entry into the promised land, we have the settlement leading to the Exile and the Return, with the latter seen as a new Exodus in Isaiah 40-55. And let's not forget the theme of rebellion and pedagogy in the desert (Hos 11:1-4), or the flight of Elijah to the mount of God. (1Kings 19). And then there is Jesus. Think of the links between their stories: the Holy Innocents (Matt 2:16-18), his call out of Egypt (Matt 2:15), his temptations in the desert (Matt 4:1-11), the transfiguration (Lk 9:28-36), the death of Jesus at Passover (Jn 19:14) and his identity as 'the lamb of God" (Jn 1:36). And then there is the beautiful litany over the water in A Prayer Book for Australia, including,

"We give you thanks that through the waters of the Red Sea you led your people out of slavery into freedom, and brought them through the river Jordan to new life in the land of promise."

And I could think of all this without trying - just shows how much there is. And consider the influence of the Exodus on Western culture generally, with our proclivity toward freedom from slavery, and all the liberation movements sprung from the basic metaphor of the movement from slavery to liberation and life in the promised land. Not to mention the Jewish/Christian insight that the voice of the victim is the voice of God, pre-eminently shown in the crucifixion, but also in the Exodus.

As the basic metaphor of the Christian life, the story of the Exodus should be taken seriously.
For example, everyone wants to go to the promised land, but rarely do we think that we should go there via the desert. And even when we do go via the desert, we seem to think we have left there before we really have. Life in Christ does not allow us to avoid the basic structure of the movement from liberation to the promised land. This is one of the basic insights from the desert tradition of the church with its discipline and asceticism. (Literally, for many of them, in the desert. See inset, St Catherine's Monastery at the foot of one possible site for Sinai.) The desert is where we learn to rely on God, and where our desires for the 'fleshpots of Egypt' can be purged. Here we will hear the voice of God, live into the convenant and hear the call of God wooing us and preparing us for entry into the promised land.

Isn't this so much our experience now? While we have whiffs of the promised land, our life now is to be thought more a preparation for the promised land, a land we have not yet reached. (Rowan Williams spends some time on this idea of the church as preparatory for heaven in Tokens of Trust, Chapter 6, focussing on the idea of becoming familiar with the truth so that, on the day of judgment, our experience is not quite so terrifying! On the theme of not yet reaching the promised land, see Heb 11:39-40) It is important to realise this, as it can prevent misunderstanding our experience, as though because we are not continually experiencing complete and unhindered intimacy with God we are somehow losing our faith, or worse, think that there isn't really a God! Or because we question and complain at times we are somehow alien to the Christian experience. None of this is true. The desert can be hard, we can hanker after Egypt, wonder where God is, yet in the midst of this have a deep sense of God's care for us and guidance toward the promised land. And even, at some point, realise the way in which God provided for us through the desert.

[Pentecost 20(A), September 28, 2008]

God is Not the One Who Pushes the First Domino

St John's Chapel, Exodus 3:1-15, the great 'I AM.'

Here is how one of the arguments for the existence of God goes. Here I am, but there is a cause as to how I got here, and a cause behind that, behind that, behind that.... until we get to God. (I had a line of dominos to push over, starting from the first domino to elucidate the point.)

And the question that comes to mind immediately? Who caused God.

Exactly. And that's why the proof doesn't work.

Except it is not the argument that Christianity developed. We don't think God is one cause among many, who just happens to be the first cause next to the first domino.

I'll come back to this.

Turning to the story today. God has heard the cry of the people, the cry of the oppressed, and God intends to free them from their slavery and lead them into a prosperous land flowing with milk and honey. Moses is a bit non-plussed by it all, and asks for God's name. And God says, "I AM".

Strange; it is incomplete. "I am a man, I am Warren Huffa, I am human, I am not a chair, etc; all these are sensible and complete. They define who I am, and do this partly by defining that I am not you, not that chair, etc. But "I AM"?

God just is. God is already complete. God doesn't need to define God's self any further, no need to define God's self over against something else. God just is.God doesn't need us to be complete. This stretches our theological imagination. Christianity thinks of God as absolutely full, with no need to define Godself in relationship to you or I, no need to compete with you or I.

Go back to the example of the dominoes. God is not therefore the one who starts the dominoes off. God is more like the reason why there are any dominoes at all. What pushes them over is as natural as the dominoes themselves. [This means that belief in God is not an alternative to science in explaining the functioning of the universe.]

When you next come to chapel I am going to use this in a subtle piece of theology, but a life transforming one.

Moses and the Burning Bush (Kids' Talk)

Pentecost 16(A)

What would God have to do to get your attention?...
How about making the lights go off, now! (Have this organised)
They'll see through it. If they don't go with the whole miraculous thing as getting their attention.

Then into the story. Last week we left Moses growing up in the palace of the king, called Pharaoh. Moses fought with the Pharaoh, and so he had to leave and go and live in the desert as a shepherd. For a long time. But God came to Moses becasue God has a special task for him. And to get his attention God made a bush burn without burning away.

Can anyone think of other ways in the Bible God gets people's attention?...

The most important way was the cross of Jesus. That gets our attention because it shows us how much God loved us.

The Great 'I AM' of Exodus 3

Sunday August 31, 2008; Pentecost 16(A) Exodus 3, the burning bush and the great 'I AM'.

Strange name: I AM. This is partly God's way of avoiding ancient paganism's method of controlling a god by knowing the god's name. But there is more than this at work here. We are being asked to stretch our theological imaginations.

'I AM' is incomplete. I might say of myself, 'I am a human,' or 'I am Warren Huffa'. 'I am' needs further explanation and definition. In this way I am who I am over-and-against that which I am not. I am human, not a rock. But not so God. God needs no further definition than 'I AM'. God is already complete, and in no need to be defined over-against anything else. God just is.

This is stretching the theological imagination. God is complete, and is so without reference to me or you. (Or anything at all, for that matter.) Nothing more can be added to God, or God's life. God is already full and complete. An absolute fullness.

Sounds remote, self-sufficient and transcendent. Nothing could be further from the truth! In fact exactly the opposite is the truth. For example, God is love, a complete fullness of love already; loving us does not add anything to God. And rather than this making God cold and distant it ensures that God's love is a free gift, with no ulterior motive (no matter how laudable) for God's benefit (not even a win-win for God and us). And because there is no ulterior benefit God's love is entirely trustworthy, because God won't arbitrarily change for the sake of God's changing needs. (This is the point Rowan Williams makes in chapter 1 of Tokens of Trust.)

Let's stretch our imaginations a little more. Jesus claims this great 'I AM' in the Gospels. Especially in John in those "I am ...": the bread of life, the good shepherd, the light of the world. And most especially John 8: "Before Abraham was, I am." But not only in John. In Matthew's version of the miracle of Jesus walking on water, Jesus calms the disciples with the "I am". So Jesus is claiming that God, who is complete and full, who is not defined over and against anthing else but just 'is', this Goid, has taken flesh in Jesus. Jesus, who is defined as himself by not being someone else, or not being a rock. How very un-Godlike. The Jesus who becomes tired, who thirsts, who weeps, and, most especially, who dies a failure on the cross. How very un-Godlike. That stretches the theological imagination.

Let's stretch it a little bit more. We hear in the Gospel today that the evidence of this claim is to be found in this most un-Godlike aspect of Jesus: his death on the cross. Not just a temporary aberration from which we should avert our eyes in embarrassment, but the evidence we need to know th claim is true. Now that stretches the imagination to breaking point - or the reformulation of who God is.

Indeed, and this is the point. The God who is absolute fullness is the fullness of love because of the cross of Jesus. There is no interruption between God and Jesus, and because of this what we say of Jesus can be predicated of God. The cross of Jesus becomes the cross of God, and God becomes the God who is for us. (Rom 8:31)

Moses in the Nile (Kids' Talk)

Pentecost 15, Exodus 1

(Have 'Moses' on some card in Hebrew.) What's this? It says 'Moses'. Who knows about Moses? (Get the answers, lead into his birth if possible.)

Essentially tell the story with props and willing volunteers.
Points:

• Last week ended in Egypt
• Now the people are slaves to a mean king called Pharaoh.
  
• Moses' mum tries to hide Moses from the soldiers, but eventually can't anymore and puts him in a basket on the River Nile.
• We had a basket with a doll, and a few volunteer reeds (hands in the air waving about)
• Big sister looks on (we got a volunteer to do this)
• Pharaoh's daughter gets the child (another volunteer, with princess headgear)
• Big sister speaks to princess, gets Moses' mum (another volunteer) to nurse Moses
• Princess names him Moses, because he is drawn out of the water.
  
• Moses ends up living in the palace 9from slavery to palace)