Clarion: Journal of Spirituality and Justice

Walking with Jesus on the Paths of the Dead - Geoff Martens

On June 29, I was playing basketball with my kids, when I blacked out. I fell backwards, banging my head on our concrete driveway, which gave me a concussion. Since my fall I have been on a journey of recovery. Psalm 91:14-16 says, "I will give you the best care, call on me and I will answer, be at you side in hard times; I will rescue and then throw you a party." And the Father gave me the best care, through Naomi and the kids, my parents, the Freshwind congregation, and from all the prayers people have prayed for me.

But the road to recovery can be hard. I am still dealing with headaches all day long. I have to be careful what I do throughout the day as well. Each day feels like I am walking, even crawling, the paths of the dead. I know that Jesus is there beside me, holding me, helping me, but I want answers. And all I seem to get is a smile from Jesus and a squeeze on my hand, which is awesome! A couple of days ago I read Psalm 143, and as I read it, I felt like this Psalm was written to me and for me. So here is Psalm 143, my version. It shares where I'm at.

Psalm 143

Listen and hear this prayer of mine, Father God. Pay attention to what I am saying and asking. You know my thoughts before I ask them. Do what is right for me. Answer me in Your faithfulness, in Your righteousness. But don’t, please don’t, haul me into your court, for in you sight no man living is righteous.

The enemy has hunted me down; he kicked me and stomped me, within and inch of my life. He has put me on the paths of the dead. I feel despair, my spirit is draining away. My heart is heavy, I’m on my knees crawling. But I am not going to cop out as you change me Jesus. I see how You are gripping me. How You are holding me close You. You will never let go of me as I crawl along the path. I stretch out my hands to embrace You - heal my wounds. Let your light shine through them. My soul longs for You, as a crawl along the paths of the dead.

Hurry with your answers, Jesus. Let me hear Your lovingkindness in the morning. For I trust You. Point me in the right direction; I am all ears, all eyes before you. Teach me how to live to please you, because you are my God, my King, my Friend. Lead me by Your blessed Spirit to see the bright dawn.

Jesus be my life. In Your light, lead me out of this path. Protect me from my enemies, make a clean sweep of those who harass me. And why? Because I am Your servant.

A Benediction for Election Season - Father Kenneth Tanner

A Benediction for Election Season

May you remember that all politics and all platforms and all legalities and all borders and all leaders are temporary.

May you recall that political movements and boundaries and personalities and programs are here one day and gone the next. All of these are passing away.

May you resist the temptation to place ultimate trust in any person, policy, party, movement, or nation—even a beautiful idea that is embodied by a nation—because there is no nation with an eternal foundation.

May you know that your kingdom is not of this world but of the world that is coming to this world and that is not yet here.

May you in the same breath grasp that *engagement* with the things of this world—not escape from its harsher, darker realities—is the sacrificial pattern of Jesus Christ.

May you discover your role in the just and merciful governance of the world God made good and pursue that cosmos-converting vocation with love amid the world's brokenness and grittiness.

May you see your work in the world—all of your callings and activities—as a participation in bringing the kingdom of heaven to earth.

May you have strength and beauty and determination and wisdom as you love your neighbor and your enemy as Christ has loved you, seeking with all persons to bring justice, mercy, and lasting peace to the earth.

May you comprehend that your salvation is not dependent on who you vote for in an election, or in whether or not you vote; that you are under no biblical or theological or moral obligation to vote for a person or party or proposal or initiative if that vote violates your conscience.

May you be grateful for the opportunity to participate in your government and if you choose not to participate in the election may you find ways to make that non-participation more than a protest, and may you find tangible ways to help and protect the poor and oppressed who might have been helped or shielded by your vote. 

May your posture toward every human leader be driven by respectful prayer, and where protest and prophecy and non-violent resistance are needed may you have the courage to speak and oppose and critique in humility and charity.

May you perceive God's love for creation in sending Jesus to embody a New Humanity, and may you join in Christ's care for the earth and all its creatures and resources, for we await with patience not only the coming of the Son in the flesh but his perfect bride, a people who beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks.

May you trust that Providence is working behind the scenes of history to draw all things to a good and fitting and proper end with justice and mercy.

Amen.

CIA, Indonesia & the Assassinations of JFK & Dag Hammarskjold - Response by W Northey

The 'Grassy Knoll'

The CIA’s Involvement in Indonesia & the Assassinations of JFK and Dag Hammarskjold

By Edward Curtin and Greg Poulgrain

With INTRO and ANALYSIS by Wayne Northey

In the “City of God,” St. Augustine tells the story of a pirate captured by Alexander the Great. The Emperor angrily demanded of him, “How dare you molest the seas?” To which the pirate replied, “How dare you molest the whole world? Because I do it with a small boat, I am called a pirate and a thief. You, with a great navy, molest the world and are called an emperor.” St. Augustine thought the pirate’s answer was “elegant and excellent.”

Noam Chomsky wrote a book, Pirates and Emperors, Old and New: International Terrorism in the Real World based on that story.

It is a truism that today’s Emperor is the President of the United States; that the US ruthlessly pursues empire throughout the entire world to remain the most powerful and richest nation on the planet; that it does whatever it takes, from assassinations the world over to instigations of genocide, to pursue those goals; that pervasive cultural “American Exceptionalism” utterly blinds the vast majority of Americans to that reality. René Girard says this kind of worldwide “scapegoat/victimage mechanism” works only as long as (in this case) Americans remain blind to the horror of their worldwide brutal exploits.

This is the job of prophets from time immemorial. Below you will read about yet one more instance of that American horror story, with a link to the original article.

CLICK HERE to continue

Canadian High Tory Tradition Offers Alternative to US-Style Politics - C.S. Morrissey

Americans horrified at the prospect of a Trump presidency talk about moving to Canada. But what if Canada offered more than just a geographical solution to anybody disgusted with American politics?

In The North American High Tory Tradition, Professor Ron Dart presents a largely forgotten tradition from Canadian history. He argues it offers everybody in North America a political philosophy worth rediscovering.

Since 1990, Ron Dart has taught in the Department of Political Science, Philosophy, and Religious Studies at the University of the Fraser Valley in Abbotsford, British Columbia. In the 1980s, he was on staff with Amnesty International.

Dart distinguishes the Canadian Tory tradition from both the conservatism and the liberalism dominant in America. By explaining how Canadian history once showed us there is a third option, Dart’s hope is Canada will rediscover the High Tory tradition, even if America continues on its downward political spiral.

He wants Canada to stop being influenced by U.S. politics into thinking the only choice modern voters can have is a binary one. Renewal in politics will come only if we can conceive of a politics with aspirations higher than what is usually presented to us in the voting booth.

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THE SATAN - by Michael Hardin - episode 20

Editor's Note: Clarion thanks Michael Hardin for freely sharing this 20-episode series (excerpted from What the Facebook? vol. 1) on The Satan.  CLICK HERE for the full pdf or kindle document.

(20) The End of the satan

This will be my last series of posts on the satan. I hope they have been helpful. I had one goal in mind when I began: to argue that the devil as it has been portrayed in the common Christian consciousness was not an accurate depiction of evil. I did this by showing that the depersonalization of the devil (or the anthropologizing of the devil) was necessary in order for us to really get at what evil is and how Jesus overcame it in his life, death and resurrection.

Evil is violence in all its forms. These forms include (but are not limited to) abuse, torture, slavery, racism, discrimination, economic deprivation, apathy, self-justification, self-defense, addiction, self-hatred/loathing, judgmentalism, exclusivism, war, and the list could go on and on. We manifest the satanic every time we point a finger at someone and blame them for our woes. We are satanic every time we seek to convince another that they should admit their complicity. We are evil when we think that those who are different than us are under God’s wrath, while we are blessed.

You see, we are the satan. Our social hatred can become internalized in our victims and they may resort to extreme behaviors: cutting, addiction, suicide. They may even manifest the horrors of the human collective unconscious as evidenced in many areas of the world where the “demonic” speaks in strange voices or tongues or exhibits unusual behavior. The closer a culture is to archaic religion, the more such manifestations can appear; the more “civilized” a culture is, the more “civilized evil will appear (this is what Hannah Arendt refers to as “the banality of evil”). Our human history is a veritable slog through the wasteland of our victims. We humans created this; we started this when we turned to violence as our solution to the problem of violence. Our whole human history is a history of violence, it is a history of our sins against one another.

Ultimately we would even gang up and kill God. And that was our undoing. How so? Because God, instead of becoming a victim who collaborated with us by admitting complicity and guilt, stood silent as a sheep before shearers. Because God, instead of becoming a retributive victim, like Abel, spoke a better word, a word of forgiveness. Because God would not even count this one great universal heinous act against us, instead saying “No one takes my life from me, I offer it of my own choice.” Our killing of God in Christ, from God’s perspective, is no crime, nor sin, but is instead God’s free choice to be the act that brings life by bringing forgiveness, by exposing the sham of our religious mechanism to take life, by nailing all accusatory instruments to the cross. In the death of God in Jesus, the old Adam, the old Cain, the old Joshua, the old Samuel, the old David, the old Deborah, the old Miriam, the old Bill, the old Jane, the old Michael, the old Lisa, they all die. They all are laid to rest. The satan died when we died with Jesus.

It is true that there is still evil in this world. We do not yet live in God’s glorious kingdom, we live between the times. But IT IS FINISHED! The satan is crushed beyond repair. The satanic capacity to deceive is forever exposed and rendered powerless. The satanic capacity to use victims to rebuild families, communities, nations and civilizations is doomed and broken forever, sabotaged by the blood of the forgiving victim Jesus Christ. It is Jesus voice that echoes down the ages since. It is the life of Jesus, raised from the dead, seated at the right hand of our Abba, poured out on all by the Spirit which empowers peoples everywhere to live for one another. It is the life of Jesus which welcomes the stranger, feeds the hungry, offers hospitality to the immigrant, weeps with the victims of war and violence, cares for the sick and heals them. It is the life of Jesus in us, through us and sometimes in spite of us, that courses through human history. He is our hope. He is transforming us, each and every one. He has defeated the devil, that old serpent. The satan has been utterly rendered back to nothingness on the cross. The judgment of the prince of this world is complete. Violence, marginalization, ostracism, shunning or discrimination will never, ever be a solution after the death of Jesus. He has forever exposed them as lies. He has brought the truth of inclusion, of acceptance, of healing, of reconciliation and of peace. He is our hope, he is our life, he is our glory. Jesus has won the cosmic Super Bowl!

He has ascended on high and been given the Unpronounceable Name. We never need live in fear of anything or anyone again.

Jesus is Victor! Amen.

Review of Richard Rohr's "The Divine Dance" - by Caleb Miller

The topic of the Trinity in Christian theology and history seems like a perennial discussion, one to which the answer is best left to the theologians and scholars to work out. Who on earth can fathom what it means to be one with God, yet simultaneously maintain the individuality we so cherish? The early fathers worked this out as “homoousian” – of the same substance – but even that language seems lacking to discuss the nature of perichoresis – crudely, interpenetration, or mutual infilling. Terminologies like “dance” seem to fit the bill in the best way possible, especially as the Trinity is discussed outside of the realm of academia.

Enter The Divine Dance by Richard Rohr & Mike Morrell. Immediately, from the foreword by Wm. Paul Young (The Shack), theology is given a proper setting, or rather context – “bad theology is like pornography”. Young immediately sets the stage for what is to follow. That is, a confession of an addiction to theological porn. And who better to take it on than Fr. Rohr?

The Contemplative Core - poem by Ron Dart

The Contemplative Core

Nada to think, for you are not ready to think.

Nada to imagine, for you are not ready to imagine.

Nada to do, for you are not ready to do.

Enter the Nada and darkness and remain there.

Rest in Nada.

To do will come when the season is right and ripe.

Kairos and Todo---lovers and dancing partners.

“I saw a light above the brightness of the sun”

 

Ron Dart

Big Sur

New Camaldoli Monastery

April 2016

"Jesus Showed Us!" colouring book - free download here

Free colouring sheets of "Jesus Showed Us!" by Bradley Jersak (author) and Shari-Anne Vis (illustrator) are now available.

CLICK HERE to download JCU colouring book 

"Security Threat Group" Embraces Jesus - Bob Ekblad

For a number of years now our local jail has housed gang-involved inmates in segregated units to avoid run-ins with enemy gang members. At times though the normal stresses of incarceration combine with internal tensions within a gang, leading to fights between fellow homies. For nearly four months this summer and fall inmates from one particular gang where locked down often three to a cell, 24/7 as deterrent and punishment for fighting.

During these months they did not benefit from weekly Bible studies nor daily time out of their cells for recreation and meals. A few weeks ago I was able to meet with this group for Bible studies two Thursday nights in a row. These thirty-minute gatherings have been precious tasters of the Kingdom of God.

The first time we met together nearly the entire inmate population of the lower tier of the pod that housed these men attended. 15 or so guys shuffled in and took their seats on blue plastic chairs around our familiar circle. Many of these men I’d known for years. Matt and I made the rounds shaking everyone’s hand, warmly welcoming them before we formally began our meeting with a prayer.

I talked directly about their official label as an STG (Security Threat Group). I invited them to look at how Jesus and his disciples were also considered an STG. 

THE SATAN - by Michael Hardin - episode 19 - "Jesus and the Satan"

Scene from "Last Days in the Desert"

Editor's Note: Clarion will be posting Michael Hardin's 20-episode series (excerpted from What the Facebook? vol. 1) on The Satan as a weekly release, each Thursday. CLICK HERE for the full pdf or kindle document.

(19) Jesus and the satan

I mentioned Jeffrey B. Gibson’s book The Temptations of Jesus in Early Christianity yesterday and I am half-tempted (pun intended) to turn this post into a lengthy book review. It is a fantastic resource for anyone who will be teaching and preaching on this topic.

When it comes to the character of the satan, Dr Gibson says the exact same thing I have been asserting in my posts, namely that Jesus was tested to use violence, that that was the content of Jesus’ testing. This dovetails quite brilliantly with Rene Girard’s insights in I See Satan Falling Like Lightning where the ‘satan’ is a metonym for the violent structuring of the victimage mechanism.

Dr Gibson says,

“The figure whom Mark designates as the perpetrator of Jesus’ wilderness temptation, whether called Satan or one of a host of other names, was not an ‘unknown quantity’. On the contrary, in Mark’s time and in the thought world in which Mark and his audience took part, Satan’s identity and the activities characteristic of him were both closely circumscribed and widely known. He was regarded primarily as the Accuser, or more specifically, the Evil Adversary, and this in two ways. First, as one who stood in opposition to God, seeking to frustrate God’s work by leading his elect astray and destroying the relationship between God and men. Second, as one whose primary activity was the proving of the faith and steadfastness, not of men in general, but of the pious.”

The question before us has always been the ‘nature’ of the satanic. I have been suggesting in these posts that we need to demythologize the devil. In other words, we need to see that the satan is not a person (as we are used to conceiving of persons) but rather a human originated principle of structuring community based upon the use of deadly violence (scapegoating). The devil is a ‘murderer.’

In the accounts of the testing of Jesus, Jesus is accosted by the satanic principle to use violence as the promised deliverer of Israel, to use power to throw out the Roman oppressors and restore Israel’s former fortune and glory. The accounts of Jesus’ testing all revolve around this theme (whether after the baptism, at Caesarea Philippi or in Gethsemane, and one may add, in the demand for a ‘sign’). If, as Girard asserts, violence is the way we humans form and maintain social relationships, then the ministry of Jesus is all about deconstructing our relationship to violence and victimization.

In the testing of Jesus, God took a huge risk. If Jesus failed in his test(s), then humanity would have been forever doomed to a cycle of retributive violence and constant apocalypse. Jesus, time and again, refused the path of the militant warrior, calling out instead for reconciliation, forgiveness and peace. This alone was God’s way, the way of his mission and message.

In his tests, Jesus confronted the possibility of his own dark side, the possibility of using violence as a solution to social crises. It was this possibility that he rejected time and again. As a metonym for scapegoating violence, Jesus overcoming of the satan has huge implications for Christians today in how they treat those whom society would use to reconstitute itself: immigrants, the LGBT community, persons of other faiths, the homeless, the poor, people of color, etc. Inasmuch as we do to the “least” of these we do to Jesus. This, and this alone, is the criterion by which we determine our relation to Jesus. Will we resist the satanic in our own thoughts and actions? Will we stand with the victims of our cultures? Will we, like Jesus, say no to power that is coercive or manipulative? Will we like Jesus renounce violence?

Imagine if all Christians everywhere were to do this. Imagine if all Christians everywhere took the side of the poor, the downtrodden, the alienated. Then we might just see the deceptions of the satan crumble before our very eyes and the reign of God brought to earth.

Next episode: (20) The End of the satan

Donald Trump & King David as ‘Flawed’ Leaders in Recent Political Discourse - Matt Lynch

The word ‘flawed’ has been bandied about this political season in the U.S., most notably as a few Christians of significant influence cobble together bizarre arguments for how Americans might in good moral conscience support Donald Trump. Most prominently, Jerry Falwell drew a comparison between Trump and Israel’s King David, and more recently, radio host Sean Hannity. Their arguments suggest that both Trump and David are ‘flawed’ leaders who either rule over, or might rule over, a great nation. King David was God’s ‘flawed’ man, and on analogy, Trump might be as well. While Trump is no saint, to expect a saint is unreasonable and even contrary to the pattern we see in Scripture.

The gains with a leader like Trump are inestimable, we’re told. Though lacking a moral compass himself, he’ll at least outsource morality to justices who will ensure that morality prevails.

Let’s set aside for a moment the obviously ‘stacked deck’ nature of this appeal to David, as opposed to, say, King Manasseh, or King Ahab, Samson, Pharaoh, or King Herod. Let’s assume for the sake of argument that Trump is a kind of David redivivus—a man after God’s own heart, flawed indeed, but chosen to lead the nation during a time of serious threats on the outside (Philistines/ISIL) and from within (disunity/moral chaos). And let’s look, as Ben Carson recently encouraged us to do, at the ‘bigger picture.’

David’s Sin and Repentance

Most appeals to David’s ‘flawed’ character have in mind his sin with Bathsheba (2 Sam 11), where David saw her bathing from his rooftop and took her for himself.[1] At this point David faced his first obstacle … her husband Uriah the Hittite. That first ‘obstacle’ to the object of David’s longing was a foreigner, and an expendable one at that. To finalize the deal, he had Uriah murdered.

The Triumph of David - Matteo Rosselli

Nonetheless, David eventually confesses his sin and repents, an act which the story clearly presents as commendable (2 Sam 12).

But let’s not stop there. Let’s concede something outrageous, that Trump’s apology was sincere and heartfelt, analogous to David’s repentance. Does the King David analogy then allow us to imagine the possibility of a brighter, greater, and more godly future? To answer this, we need to focus on the aftermath of David’s sin and repentance, and not solely at the simple fact that God uses a flawed leader.

CLICK HERE to continue

Review of Gisela H. Kreglinger's "The Spirituality of Wine" - by Stephen Imbach

Stephen Imbach was the founder and director of Soulstream, a dispersed contemplative community that also trains spiritual directors. 

A few gleanings from reading one of my favorite books “The Spirituality of Wine” by Gisela H. Kreglinger.

A well-crafted wine teaches us that the world is bursting with the grandeur of God.  Savoring a glass of wine reveals something of the abundant generosity of God.  God could have just provided us with water, but for the joy and pleasure of his people and to reveal his extensive, loving generosity he gave us wine.  Christ’s first miracle of turning water into wine at the wedding feast at Cana was not just a happen-stance, but expresses Christ’s desire for us as community to joyfully celebrate the grandeur of God and the abundant gifts of his creation.  Sharing wine in community allows us to lift our hearts toward God and to one another.

Historically, the church has been ambivalent toward our God given capacity to smell, feel and taste; setting these senses apart from spirituality.  The vintner can be a tremendous aide in the recovery of our God- given senses, turning them toward a life of contemplation.  Of course there will always be those who abuse the gifts of God, but a well-crafted wine encourages us to expand our senses into becoming prayer.  As we enjoy the pleasure of drinking a glass of wine we are offering our delight to the God who gave us such an unnecessary, excessive gift.  Enjoying God’s delightful gift of wine is truly a rich experience of worshipping our Creator. 

It would be incredible to see Western Christianity embrace, without reservation, the joy of delighting in God’s gift of wine as a sincere, honest way of enhancing our relationship with God and each other.     

The Likely Cause of Addiction: Disconnection - reflections on Johann Hari by Michael Peterson & Brad Jersak

"The opposite of addiction is not sobriety. It is human connection." 

- Johann Hari

 

 

In his Jan. 1015 article, entitled, "The Likely Cause of Addiction Has Been Discovered, and It Is Not What You Think," Johann Hari (author of Chasing The Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs) presents a strong case for believing that addictions are rooted, not in chemical hooks, but in disconnection or alienation. The best treatment, he proposes, is human connection. I.e. love. Dr. C. Michael Peterson and Brad Jersak reflect on these findings. 

Michael Peterson

Two thoughts:

 

1) The author contrasts the traditional treatment approach of bio-behavioral therapies and cognitive interventions vs. a love-based approach. Her final sentence stated:

"For a century now, we have been singing war songs about addicts. It occurred to me as I wiped his brow, we should have been singing love songs to them all along."

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What are the Politics of Jesus? Richard Rohr

07 Richard Rohr - What are “the politics of Jesus”? from Plain Truth Ministries on Vimeo.

Guest editorial - Michael Hardin: The Real Victim of the Presidential Debates

I woke up in the middle of the night last night to watch the second presidential debate between Trump and Clinton. It was not a debate, but then neither was the first one. I learned to debate in high school and was eventually captain of our debate team but I have to say last evening was nothing short of an illuminating fiasco.

The main casualty of the debate last night was truth. The truth was buried in half-truths, lies, deception, misdirection and all manner of innuendo. We discovered that Hilary is the devil, thank you Donald for projecting your own dark side onto her. We learned that substantive issues about real life were given the shove off the cliff. We watched as two alleged adults, vying for what is arguably the most powerful political office in the world, acted more like children on a playground. We watched the debates and Aleppo burned. We got angry at either Trump or Hilary (depending on whom you prefer) but we saw no anger for the children lying among the ashes of war and violence. In short, we learned nothing.

God cannot become something evil - and God became human! Kenneth Tanner

"If she could carry You, it was because You, the great mountain, had lightened Your weight; If she feeds You, it is because You had taken on hunger, if she gives You to drink, it is because You, of Your own will, had thirsted." —Saint Ephrem the Syrian.

God became human in Jesus Christ. God cannot become something evil. God does not become something God hates. May your outlook on humanity be informed by God's profound solidarity with humanity—with every single human person—in the Incarnation of the Son.

The central Christian conviction is that the Creator of all things, the God who spoke the worlds into existence from nothing, the One who holds all things in life, became a mere human.

God did not become a human with immunities to ordinary physics, with a body impervious to pain or disease. Jesus was *not* Superman.

And Christians confess at the same time that this ordinary man from Nazareth was not someone with godlike qualities but God—the God.

And I just want to say two things about this startling confession that God became flesh: God cannot become something evil and God does not become something God hates.

Humanity was made by God and God only makes good things.

God cannot make evil.

Humanity is inherently *good* and declared good by God on the sixth day of their creative work. And if this were not so, if humanity was inherently evil, God could never have become one of us.

Too many humans hate humanity, and in our hatred for ourselves we too often focus on the worst things that humans do. And it's true that we are all of us not well; that we are all of us in need of the healing work of God.

And yet, in spite of dark angelic and human contempt for humanity—even as many of us seek to escape our humanity, and leave this incarnate, embodied state—God chose to so identify Godself with the human family as to take on human flesh forever in the person of the Son. 

Because of Jesus an embodied human is one Person of the Godhead, and God has therefore manifested in Christ an intimate solidarity with every human person. Everyone.

And though every human is in need of God's grace and forgiveness and redemption, and though we have all fallen short of God's created intentions for us as humans, and though we have failed to love as God loves, and though we have walked away from Love, God chooses—of all things in his creation—to unite himself to the human race, to be one of us, to put to everlasting shame everyone and everything that would oppose the human.

Think of the person you despise the most, the human that inspires hatred in you, who makes your skin crawl, whom you loath, and then come to understand something and come to understand this at your core: God has in Jesus Christ drawn nearer to that person in love than it is possible for you to understand or articulate, that God desires that person so much that God died to have never-ending friendship with that person from age to age.

 

 

Evelyn Underhill and C.S. Lewis: Elective Affinities - Ron Dart

It is this capacity for giving imaginative body to the fundamental doctrines of Christianity that seems to me one of the most remarkable things about your work. - Evelyn Underhill letter to C.S. Lewis (January 13 1941)   

Many with a minimal literary background will have read articles or books by C.S. Lewis. The Lewis of popular consumption is certainly not the more nuanced and layered Lewis. The more popular books by Lewis were, mostly, published in the 1940s-1950s to his death in 1963. There have been many letters, books, articles by Lewis published since his death. But, the C.S. Lewis of the 1930s was still in the budding phase with a few blossoms that hinted further fruit.

The rather abstract and initial autobiography of Lewis’ journey to Christian faith, The Pilgrim’s Regress: An Allegorical Apology for Christianity, Reason and Romanticism, left the publishing press in 1933. It is certainly not one of Lewis’ better books, but there are hints in it of finer things to come. The emergence of Lewis, the Oxford don and  Medieval literary scholar, was clearly established when The Allegory of Love: A Study in Medieval Tradition left the publishing tarmac in 1936. Who would have guessed by the mid-1930s that Lewis was about to launch as a significant writer of international breadth and depth, and that his first real work of imaginative fiction would appeal to Evelyn Underhill?

THE SATAN - by Michael Hardin - episode 18 - "Jesus' Testing"

Editor's Note: Clarion is posting Michael Hardin's 20-episode series (excerpted from What the Facebook? vol. 1) on The Satan as a weekly release, each Thursday. CLICK HERE for the full pdf or kindle document.

(18) Jesus’ Testing

In my last post on the satan I said I was going to follow up with some thoughts on Jesus’ temptations in the Gospels. Imagine my surprise then to find I had a “follower” who had written his PhD on this very subject, Dr. Jeffrey B. Gibson. By chance or by the grace of God I had found his book The Temptations of Jesus in Early Christianity last year on my trip to Australia and had read it while traveling down under. (Whew!). So, this past several days I have revisited that book along with an article by Dr. Gibson and much to my delight found that indeed we are tracking along the same path. For this reason, these next few posts are going to lean heavily on his work and I am going to quote him more extensively than I have others in my previous posts. Although I am certain he may not agree with all I write I thank him for his magisterial work on this topic and urge anyone interested in delving more deeply into this topic to read his book.

When one compares the gospel accounts of Jesus’ testing in the wilderness following the baptism, it is easy to see that Matthew and Luke have ‘expanded’ narratives and Mark’s gospel contains a brief account. On this basis some have argued that Mark’s account does not offer much detail. Gibson has challenged this reading noting that the use of the words ‘the Spirit’, ‘desert’, ‘testing’ all would trigger immediate inter-textual echoes (or references to Old Testament stories of Israel’s testing in the wilderness).

Today I want to focus on the content of that testing in Jesus’ life by noting three important things.

First, the episode of Jesus’ testing found in Mark 1:12-13 (“At once the Spirit forced Jesus out into the wilderness. ¹³ He was in the wilderness for forty days, tempted by Satan. He was among the wild animals, and the angels took care of him”) is not the only test of Jesus. Mark bookends his gospel with another test of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane (Mark 14:32-53). While this text does not explicitly state the nature of the test, it becomes clear that the test involves Jesus’ fidelity to his call and mission to renounce violence. This is clearer in Luke 22:38 where Jesus says in reply to the disciples bringing swords, “Enough of that!” or Matthew 26:52-53 where Jesus says “Put the sword back into its place. All those who use the sword will die by the sword. ⁵³ Or do you think that I’m not able to ask my Father and he will send to me more than twelve battle groups of angels right away? ⁵⁴ But if I did that, how would the scriptures be fulfilled that say this must happen?” Mark’s gospel is thus bracketed at the beginning and end of Jesus’ ministry with the same test: would Jesus renounce the use of violence, force and coercive power or would he succumb to them?

Second, Gibson points out that the word that is sometimes translated “to tempt” has less to do with Jesus’ struggle with greed, avarice, lust etc, and more to do with the central focus of his mission: how to reveal that God is nonviolent. He says “When the participle – indeed, any form of ‘pierazo’ – was used, as in Mk. 1:13a, with reference to a person, its connotation was even more specific: being probed and proved, often through hardship and adversity, in order to determine the extent of one’s worthiness to be entrusted with, or the degree of one’s loyalty or devotion to, a given commission and its constraints.

So “central” was this connotation to this usage of the participle and its root, that the statement that someone was “being tested” could not be made without communicating the idea that person was undergoing an experience in which his character or fidelity was being ‘put to the proof’.” The great test for Jesus had to do with the possibility that he might succumb to the use of violence as a justifiable means to accomplish his Abba’s will.

Third, if this is not clear from Gethsemane, it is clear by another passage where Jesus is tested; at Caesarea Philippi in Mark 8:27-38. Here again Jesus is tested, this time by his main man, Peter, to renounce his idyllic hippie, tree-hugging vision and get with the revolutionary program. Jesus calls Peter a “scandalon” which is the worst relation one could possibly be in relation to Jesus. Peter would have Jesus take up the mantle of the Davidic Warrior Messiah, act like Phineas with zeal for God’s holy will and start a holy war like the Maccabees. Jesus renounces Peter’s violent ideology. So Mark 1, Mark 8 and Mark 14 are the three great tests of Jesus in the gospels. Tomorrow we shall look at The Tester.

Next episode: (19) Jesus and the satan

Review of Abraham Friesen's "Menno Simons" - by Ron Dart

Review: Abraham Friesen, Menno Simons: Dutch Reformer Between Luther, Erasmus, and the Holy Spirit: A Study in the Problem Areas of Menno Scholarship (Xlibris, 2015).

The origins of the Anabaptist Tradition is an ongoing and contested one--from a monogenesis of pacifism and peace to a varied and complex polygenesis, the history of 16th century Anabaptist research remains lively and animated, both in the beginnings and contemporary applications of such an interpretation. Then, there is, of course, the haunting demon of the Munster Rebellion of 1534-1535 that lingers and will not disappear.      

The appeal of Abraham Friesen’s book, Menno Simons: Dutch Reformer Between Luther, Erasmus and the Holy Spirit, is the way he ably and nimbly navigates the important areas of Menno scholarship. It is impossible, of course, to disconnect Menno Simons from his historic context, hence Part I of the tome (“The Reformation, An Era of Recovery and Conflict: Revolutions, Spiritual and Material”) reveals, on a broad and convincing cavass the reality within which Simons lived, moved and had his being. The more pressing and not to be denied or ignored context is covered in much more depth and detail in Part II (“The Movement: Munster as Background and Context”). Friesen devotes almost 100 pages (about ¼ of the book) to the Munster Rebellion from which Menno Simons articulated and lived forth an alternate faith journey and, in many ways, birthed the Mennonites.

What is the Point of 'Evangelism'? Christopher James

What's the point of 'evangelism'?

I got to thinking critically about this question roughly ten days ago in Yosemite National Park.

Me and two of my close friends had woken up at dawn to catch the sunrise up at Taft Point. Once we had arrived, we realized that we nearly had the entire view to ourselves. After spending some time taking photographs, we settled down and decided to brew some coffee and nourish ourselves in the serenity of our surroundings. I can confidently confirm that a cup of coffee (even though filtered through a paper towel) tastes absolutely divine when you are simultaneously admiring El Capitan–the iconic, granite face of Yosemite Valley–standing authoritatively in the distance.

To top off this incredible morning, the three of us decided to have a short devotion before heading back to camp to rejuvenate for our busy afternoon plans. With me, I had brought a book that I am currently reading by theologian Bradley Jersak, entitled A More Christlike God. I began reading aloud from his chapter “The Cross As Divine Consent.” Although I only read about a third of the chapter aloud that morning, the three of us managed to engage in a deep dialogue about the theological ideas proposed in the book.

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