Good points! Death is already defeated. Church folk don’t talk about death, preferring comfort and hope instead.
Here is something to consider, perhaps it will resonate with you. John 3:6-
That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.c 7Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘Youd must be born again.’ 8The winde blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
We are ‘born from above’ as Jesus put it, when he returns and/or we are raised in the first resurrection. That’s when we will BE spirit.
So are you kind of saying that God allowing violence in the Old Testament is a little like God allowing divorce because of the hardness of our hearts? The violence by God’s people in the OT has bothered me for a long time. Especially in stark contrast to the teachings of Jesus.
That’s definitely one way to look at it. The Law under which Israel lived was one step in God’s redemptive plan. It wasn’t a full and complete picture of how God intended his people to live forever. The Law’s job was to help preserve Israel until the Messiah came to establish his kingdom.
Wes can answer the question: is it wrong to serve in the military and therefore, go to war if instigated? Is it wrong for someone to defend themselves and possibly kill someone in the process? A lot of folks have asked those questions and you didn’t answer them!
Thanks, James. As a reminder, the goal of this series was not to answer those questions. The goal of this series was to respond to the objections I have received when I tell people my convictions about nonviolence. I am committed to cruciform peacemaking and many Christians object and tell me why I am wrong to take this position. This series was simply my way of responding to those objections. God bless, brother.
Always interesting and a difficult question to answer. God doesn't seem to simply accommodate the situation people are in, but gives commands to destroy every animal, woman, child, and man in a city. That is something I grapple with. Of course, these people are enemies of God and His Chosen People, but the children? On the other side of the coin I see God's compassion for Hagar and Ishmael ... his allowance for Rahab ... his willingness to relent if Nineveh will repent (and they did). I struggle with it in the context of loving God, seeing the God that Jesus reveals, and seeing the Kingdom as you have presented it here.
Generally, institutional 'Christianity' largely creates its/their Creator’s nature in their own fallible and often angry, vengeful image. ... Really, if the Divine is as vengefully angry, even seemingly blood-thirsty, as institutional Christianity generally portrays Him to be, is anyone — including supposed ardent followers or conservative Bible believers — truly safe or really ‘saved’? One could reasonably theorize that He’d be especially peeved by those self-professed Christians He’d (likely rightfully) deem as fake or frauds.
After all, Jesus, as God incarnate, was/is about non-violence, genuine compassion, love, charity and non-wealth. His teachings and practices epitomize so much of the primary component of socialism — do not hoard gratuitous wealth in the midst of great poverty. But, they are not practiced by a significant number of ‘Christians’, likely including many who idolize callous politicians standing for very little or nothing Jesus taught and represents.
Prominent actually-Christlike Christian leaders/voices should often strongly-emphasize what Jesus fundamentally taught and demonstrated to his followers. However strange that sounds, institutional Christianity seems to need continuous reminding. They all should consider that the Biblical Jesus would not have rolled his eyes and sighed: ‘Oh, well. I’m against what the politician stands for, but what can you do when you dislike even more his political competition?’
Christ was viciously murdered largely because he did not in the least behave in accordance with corrupted human conduct and expectation—and in particular because he was nowhere near being the angry and sometimes even bloodthirsty behemoth so many theists seemingly wanted or needed their Creator and savior to be and therefore believed he’d have to be.
Christ’s nature and teachings even left John the Baptist, who believed in him as the savior, bewildered by his apparently contradictory version of the Hebraic messiah, with which John had been raised. Perhaps most perplexing was the Biblical Jesus’ revolutionary teaching of non-violently offering the other cheek as the proper response to being physically assaulted by one’s enemy. The Biblical Jesus also most profoundly washed his disciples’ feet, the act clearly revealing that he took corporeal form to serve.
Perhaps some ‘Christians’ even find inconvenient, if not plainly annoying, trying to reconcile the conspicuous inconsistency in the fundamental nature of the New Testament’s Jesus with the wrathful, vengeful and even jealous nature of the Old Testament’s God. But for many of us, Godly greatness need not be defined as the ability to destroy and harshly punish, as opposed to the willingness and compacity for compassionate forgiveness, non-violence and humility.
It seems to me that America is on its way to being damned; never mind it somehow being God-blessed. Some of the best humanitarians that I, as a big fan of Christ’s unmistakable miracles and fundamental message, have met or heard about were/are atheists or agnostics who, quite ironically, would make better examples of many of Christ’s teachings/practices than too many ‘Christians’. Conversely, some of the worst human(e) beings I’ve met or heard about are the most devout believers/preachers of fundamental Biblical theology.
Good points! Death is already defeated. Church folk don’t talk about death, preferring comfort and hope instead.
Here is something to consider, perhaps it will resonate with you. John 3:6-
That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.c 7Do not marvel that I said to you, ‘Youd must be born again.’ 8The winde blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
We are ‘born from above’ as Jesus put it, when he returns and/or we are raised in the first resurrection. That’s when we will BE spirit.
https://open.substack.com/pub/dfinster/p/why-we-are-not-born-again-at-baptism?r=4bo2uv&utm_medium=ios
So are you kind of saying that God allowing violence in the Old Testament is a little like God allowing divorce because of the hardness of our hearts? The violence by God’s people in the OT has bothered me for a long time. Especially in stark contrast to the teachings of Jesus.
That’s definitely one way to look at it. The Law under which Israel lived was one step in God’s redemptive plan. It wasn’t a full and complete picture of how God intended his people to live forever. The Law’s job was to help preserve Israel until the Messiah came to establish his kingdom.
Wes can answer the question: is it wrong to serve in the military and therefore, go to war if instigated? Is it wrong for someone to defend themselves and possibly kill someone in the process? A lot of folks have asked those questions and you didn’t answer them!
Those are questions we are each meant to answer for ourselves
Thanks, James. As a reminder, the goal of this series was not to answer those questions. The goal of this series was to respond to the objections I have received when I tell people my convictions about nonviolence. I am committed to cruciform peacemaking and many Christians object and tell me why I am wrong to take this position. This series was simply my way of responding to those objections. God bless, brother.
Always interesting and a difficult question to answer. God doesn't seem to simply accommodate the situation people are in, but gives commands to destroy every animal, woman, child, and man in a city. That is something I grapple with. Of course, these people are enemies of God and His Chosen People, but the children? On the other side of the coin I see God's compassion for Hagar and Ishmael ... his allowance for Rahab ... his willingness to relent if Nineveh will repent (and they did). I struggle with it in the context of loving God, seeing the God that Jesus reveals, and seeing the Kingdom as you have presented it here.
Generally, institutional 'Christianity' largely creates its/their Creator’s nature in their own fallible and often angry, vengeful image. ... Really, if the Divine is as vengefully angry, even seemingly blood-thirsty, as institutional Christianity generally portrays Him to be, is anyone — including supposed ardent followers or conservative Bible believers — truly safe or really ‘saved’? One could reasonably theorize that He’d be especially peeved by those self-professed Christians He’d (likely rightfully) deem as fake or frauds.
After all, Jesus, as God incarnate, was/is about non-violence, genuine compassion, love, charity and non-wealth. His teachings and practices epitomize so much of the primary component of socialism — do not hoard gratuitous wealth in the midst of great poverty. But, they are not practiced by a significant number of ‘Christians’, likely including many who idolize callous politicians standing for very little or nothing Jesus taught and represents.
Prominent actually-Christlike Christian leaders/voices should often strongly-emphasize what Jesus fundamentally taught and demonstrated to his followers. However strange that sounds, institutional Christianity seems to need continuous reminding. They all should consider that the Biblical Jesus would not have rolled his eyes and sighed: ‘Oh, well. I’m against what the politician stands for, but what can you do when you dislike even more his political competition?’
Christ was viciously murdered largely because he did not in the least behave in accordance with corrupted human conduct and expectation—and in particular because he was nowhere near being the angry and sometimes even bloodthirsty behemoth so many theists seemingly wanted or needed their Creator and savior to be and therefore believed he’d have to be.
Christ’s nature and teachings even left John the Baptist, who believed in him as the savior, bewildered by his apparently contradictory version of the Hebraic messiah, with which John had been raised. Perhaps most perplexing was the Biblical Jesus’ revolutionary teaching of non-violently offering the other cheek as the proper response to being physically assaulted by one’s enemy. The Biblical Jesus also most profoundly washed his disciples’ feet, the act clearly revealing that he took corporeal form to serve.
Perhaps some ‘Christians’ even find inconvenient, if not plainly annoying, trying to reconcile the conspicuous inconsistency in the fundamental nature of the New Testament’s Jesus with the wrathful, vengeful and even jealous nature of the Old Testament’s God. But for many of us, Godly greatness need not be defined as the ability to destroy and harshly punish, as opposed to the willingness and compacity for compassionate forgiveness, non-violence and humility.
It seems to me that America is on its way to being damned; never mind it somehow being God-blessed. Some of the best humanitarians that I, as a big fan of Christ’s unmistakable miracles and fundamental message, have met or heard about were/are atheists or agnostics who, quite ironically, would make better examples of many of Christ’s teachings/practices than too many ‘Christians’. Conversely, some of the worst human(e) beings I’ve met or heard about are the most devout believers/preachers of fundamental Biblical theology.
By this argument, we have to accept that we are wrong to participate in modern medicine as we would be cheating the death intended for us.