And how do we rank?

[A] deeper understanding of these texts in their cultural contexts can facilitate our asking new questions about our own practices. From the observations above about what the hymns tell us about early Christian worship, we can pose and initial set of basic questions about the extent to which contemporary hymnody or liturgical song or worship music reflects the features of the earliest Christian hymns. These questions might be seen as taking inventory of the state of our worship without necessarily passing any judgment on the findings. For example, how does today’s worship through song demonstrate a connection to inherited tradition? In what ways does it engage with current cultures? How does it resist competing ideologies that embody values contrary to the way of Jesus? Does it acknowledge and celebrate the reality of the new era inaugurated by Jesus? To what extent are the cross, resurrection, and exaltation features of contemporary worship songs? The spirit of these questions is not evaluative or judgmental. Rather, these are descriptive questions that ask us to think about the ways in which our worship currently reflects these dynamics.—Matthew Gordley, New Testament Christological Hymns, p. 233

<idle musing>
And how does most contemporary music rate on this scale? Pretty much a zero, isn't it? Sad.
</idle musing>

Once more, round the web

Are you a teacher and had a bad week? I remember those—especially when I was teaching high school! Take a look at this post for some encouragement. He's right : )

Speaking of school, this article is spot on. Here's the opening gambit, and it should make you read the whole article:

The most damaging thing you learned in school wasn't something you learned in any specific class. It was learning to get good grades.

When I was in college, a particularly earnest philosophy grad student once told me that he never cared what grade he got in a class, only what he learned in it. This stuck in my mind because it was the only time I ever heard anyone say such a thing.

He's right. By the way, the title of the article is "The Lesson to Unlearn." And speaking of unlearning, maybe libraries need to unlearn charging fines. Take a look at this article. Summary: Less fines equals more use. Kind of like grace versus law : )

Shifting gears a bit, worried about fragmentation of society? Seems like everyone is today. I've run across a few articles this week along those lines. Here is this:

So, how should kingdom people in America respond to this social fragmentation. First, if any aspect of your essential well-being is anchored in the well-being of America, or any other nation, I’m afraid you’re going to be anxious, frustrated and disappointed. A wiser course of action would be to divest yourself of all hope in America and all other nations of the world, and instead anchor your well-being in the only King and Kingdom that you have reason to believe will last forever.

And Jim E. sent me this one this morning:

We Americans are locked in political combat and focused on President Trump, but there is a cancer gnawing at the nation that predates Trump and is larger than him. Suicides are at their highest rate since World War II; one child in seven is living with a parent suffering from substance abuse; a baby is born every 15 minutes after prenatal exposure to opioids; America is slipping as a great power.

We have deep structural problems that have been a half century in the making, under both political parties, and that are often transmitted from generation to generation. Only in America has life expectancy now fallen three years in a row, for the first time in a century, because of “deaths of despair.”

“The meaningfulness of the working-class life seems to have evaporated,” Angus Deaton, the Nobel Prize-winning economist, told us. “The economy just seems to have stopped delivering for these people.” Deaton and the economist Anne Case, who is also his wife, coined the term “deaths of despair” to describe the surge of mortality from alcohol, drugs and suicide.

And it goes on. Good stuff; do read it.

Here's an interesting repost from over 100 years ago. Small snippet of prophetic stuff:

Many of us believe that our nation has a peculiar mission to restore peace. Nothing is so likely to tamper with our judicial qualities, to undermine the confidence of other nations in our sincere friendship, and thus to frustrate that mission of peace, as the growth of these war interests. They will create an American “war party.” When the foreign market fails, they will turn to the home market, and we shall feel their influence in the demand for American militarism.

Anybody care to deny that's what's going on? I didn't think so—especially since 9/11/2001.

In even less encouraging news, the United Methodist Church has decided to acknowledge that they are anything but united (and haven't been since probably the mid-1970s). This article is probably the best summary of the situation I've read. Most other ones either don't grasp the depth and length of the problem, or ignore it to score culture war points. Sad; it was my denomination growing up and well into my late 30s.

How about some theology? Roger Olson takes on Greg Boyd and others who deny substitutionary atonement. I agree with Roger; you can't have full reconciliation without substitutionary atonement, but not the popularly defined version of penal substitution! A good book to read is Scot McKnight's A Community Called Atonement. I can't recommend it highly enough.

Concerned about the Middle East? Take a look at a guest post on Ron Sider's blog. Amen and amen.

Two final posts here. One on a professor taking a stand on transgender studies. The other, it appears that in France after generations of looking the other way about underage sexual exploitation, the women are speaking up. A well-known French author is being held accountable and the laws are being enforced and tightened. Interesting world we live in, isn't it?

What is worship?

We have worked from an understanding that worship is more than just spoken words or ritual actions or inner thoughts and beliefs. Worship certainly can include those things, but it also cannot be reduced to any one of them. Instead, worship is, in its broadest scope, an intentional practice of affirming, proclaiming, and confessing an allegiance to God that, among other things, enables the worshiper to see himself or herself as part of a reality that is larger than the visible reality on offer within the world in which the worshiper lives. Worship, in this sense, would include words, actions, and rituals, together with an overall pattern of values and priorities that constitute the orientation of one’s life. Within this broad way of thinking about worship, one can worship God through song, prayer, sacrament, and meditation in a congregational or other religious setting (1 Cor 14:26; Col 3:16). But one can also worship God through the performance of one’s day—to—day responsibilities. Even the most mundane of activities can be considered worship of God when acted out with an awareness that it is being done “in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him” (Col 3:17; cf. Rom 12:1).—Matthew Gordley, New Testament Christological Hymns, p. 232

The continuing tradition

One third-century hymn, “Phos Hilaron [Jesus Christ the cheerful light],” is still in use today. The developments in these later hymns are noted by McGuckin [Path of Christianity], who explains that those “tendencies toward personal mystical union evoked in the second-century materials” were later set aside in favor of more dogmatic and instructive hymnody in the post—Nicene era.” But he also notes that this dimension of early Christian worship was not entirely lost: “This more intimate psychic aspect of hymnic writing passed on into the ascetical literature of the Eastern church."—Matthew Gordley, New Testament Christological Hymns, p. 231

So what does it prove?

First the christological hymns as a whole portray Christ as the exalted Lord who is the ultimate victor over all powers. This victor motif was important to vindicate Christ in light of his shameful death on the cross. It was also important in drawing out the implications of Christ’s present status for the daily practical realities of his followers. Christ’s exalted status offered hope to believers in the midst of the Roman World in which Christ was not yet obviously reigning as Lord.

Second, as a result of this exalted status above all powers, Christ is understood to be worthy of worship alongside God. This participation in receiving worship was implicit in some hymns but explicit in others. These two themes cohere with Ralph Martin’s summary statement: “If there is one motif that pervades the New Testament hymns, it is this ringing assurance that Christ is victor over all man’s enemies, and is rightly worshipped as the Image of the God who is over all.” Bauckham expresses something similar when he writes, “The earliest hymns celebrated the saving death and heavenly exaltation of Jesus as the one who now shares the divine throne and, as God’s plenipotentiary, receives the homage of all creation.” The exalted status of Jesus is closely connected with the idea that he is worthy of divine worship.—Matthew Gordley, New Testament Christological Hymns, p. 225

The purpose

Finally, with their high concentration of poetic features or elevated stylistic features, their focus on divine realities associated with God’s plan for humanity through Christ, together with their use of imagery and themes that resonated with their cultural contexts, it seems that the early christological hymns were far more than just a codification of doctrine or a logical statement of Christian beliefs. Rather, as hymns these passages also had an affective dimension and an allusive quality that had the potential to engage the emotions as well as the mind. Accordingly, early Christian worship offered imagery and language that had an evocative power capable of engaging the emotions of its participants and enabling them to see themselves as part of an imaginal world in which all powers are subject to the exalted Jesus. In some instances early Christian hymns explicitly brought into view a verbal picture of the exalted Jesus. In all cases, through language associated with praise of the divine, they invited their listeners as worshipers into an experience of the realities about which they spoke.—Matthew Gordley, New Testament Christological Hymns, p. 224

around the web

Welcome to the first 2020 look around the web from my viewpoint. Perhaps you'll find something of interest, perhaps not. But at least enjoy the ride...

You aren't paranoid; you really are being followed! And not only that, frequently you are paying for that questionable privilege. This article has all the juicy details. By the way, I started using Jumbo and was surprised by how many things I had failed to set on my privacy settings. I'm usually pretty strict, but it caught some I didn't even know existed. Highly recommended.

Meanwhile, the reaction to the Christianity Today editorial has been strong from the pro-Trump team. Michael Bird has some good insights; here's a small snippet:

Now I understand how pro-Trumpers can say, “Hey, he’s no Mother Theresa, but he’s effective, he’s appointed conservatives to SCOTUS, and he’s our bodyguard protecting us against the pathologically Christian hating types in the Democratic party.” I get it, I don’t agree, but I get it. But for Grudem to say in effect that Good Policies = Good Man is morally blindsided and sets a dangerous precedent.

I’ve never liked liberal theology because it produces a God without wrath who brings men and women without sin to a kingdom without judgment thanks to the ministrations of a Christ without a cross [that’s from Niebuhr]. Yet I fear Grudem’s Trumpology because it presents a God with partisan mercy, who expects men and women to ignore their moral compasses, to call the wicked good and the good wicked, in order to keep themselves positioned in the court of earthly power.

And John Hawthorne, an evangelical sociologist has some good thoughts:

It must be noted that most evangelical churchgoers may not be paying any attention to these conflicts. They are happy to go to their Sunday Services and worship Jesus in song and word. Emma Green had a great interview with former head of the National Association of Evangelicals Leith Anderson. He argues that evangelicalism is about faith and not about politics. Emma tries valiantly and compassionately to get him to address the conflict therein, but he never gets there. Sarah McCammon interviewed a pair of Southern Baptist pastors (note: lots of evangelicals are not Southern Baptists!) on Saturday’s Weekend All Things Considered. The pastors argued that while there are broad social conflicts, people “at the level of the pew” don’t experience that division.

It needs to be recognized that the privatization of faith is what has allowed a public political stance that is largely divorced from deep theological insight. If we ever need serious work on political theology, it is today. Even though it runs the risk of causing short-term discomfort within local congregations, it would create a more healthy body of Christ as it interrogates matters of politics and public policy.

But don't look for that to happen anytime soon. Discomfort means a possible budget shortfall in the church building program, or that the megapastor won't get his million dollar bonus, or something like that. Besides, who wants to think? That's hard work. Nope. Keep the bread and circuses coming and everything will be fine. Except it won't.

Take a look at John Fea's blog. He's been following the Trump phenomena closely since 2016 and is quite insightful. Here's a recent sample:

Would a non-college educated factory worker in the Midwest who claims the name of Jesus Christ think that racism, misogyny, nativism, the degradation of one’s enemies, and lying are moral problems? Wouldn’t any Christian, formed by the teachings of a local church and the spiritual disciplines (as opposed to the daily barrage of Fox News), see the need to condemn such behavior? What does social class have to do with it? Shouldn’t one’s identity in the Gospel and its moral implications for living transcend class identity?

For those who are lamenting disunion in the church, I have another question: Shouldn’t the church be an otherworldly, counter-cultural institution that finds some unity in the condemnation of immoral behavior in the corridors of national power? Or should we take our marching orders from the divisive, class-based identity politics of Donald Trump?

And long-time pacifist/activist/theologian/seminary professor Ron Sider chimes in, citing Christmas, urging Christians to look at the bigger picture:

Christ has chosen the church as the place where his reign is to become most visible and powerful. And that means that Christians must live and promote biblical values about truth, justice, freedom, life and peace both in their personal lives and their political decisions. It also means that no matter who wins elections or what politicians do, God’s reign continues to take shape on this earth. When politicians are at their worst, defying Christ and promoting evil, Christ’s kingdom can still advance. (Although when people who claim the name of Jesus join evil politicians, God’s kingdom suffers serious setbacks.) And when politicians are most sympathetic to biblical values, they are still a mixed bag of good and evil, and everything they do is less important than proclaiming the gospel and living as Jesus’ new redeemed body of believers.

OK, one last look at this and then we'll move on to other things. Righting of America takes a look at a defense of Trump written by a Jack Graham, senior pastor of Prestonwood Baptist Church, Plano, Texas. I have to agree with the final paragraphs of the critique:

I am not calling into question Rev. Graham’s sincerity because I have no doubt of his sincerity. I am sure he is a very serious and sincere Christian. What I don’t recognize is the Christianity he represents. I am convinced that the Christianity represented by the evangelical defenders of President Trump is in fact not Christian. It is not shaped by the gospel but by the secular political philosophy of evangelical leaders. It is an “Americanized” faith that has faith in the USA, in “Make America Great Again,” in a false patriotism that excludes dissenters, in a greed-infested idolatry of wealth, in an ignoring of the teachings of the prophets and especially of Jesus.

This version of Christianity no longer knows how to recognize idolatry. It exists in an atmosphere of fear, nostalgia, and a deep-seated desire to have the power to control others (John Fea, Believe Me). Pulling no punches, Stanley Hauerwas concludes that churches identified with the “church growth movement” are nothing more than paganism in disguise” (In Good Company: The Church as Polis, Kindle ed., 4).

What Rev. Graham defends is not historic evangelical faith, but a Trump evangelical understanding rooted in secular political power and wealth. Graham’s argument in behalf of President Trump represents just another example of the church and her preachers failing to take the radical good news of Jesus to heart and apply it to all of life.

Violence! Everywhere violence! Whether church or synagogue shootings, or drone attacks, it seems our society is addicted to violence. What's a Christian to do? The ReKnew blog takes a look:

If Jesus is Lord, we are commanded to renounce violence as a way of resisting evil. We renounce the violence of evil men (it’s always men right?) and we renounce the cycle that so easily ensnares our sanctified minds. Fear of death corrodes our ability to imagine a faithful response beyond full participation in the cycle of violence. Death, and the fear of it, are signs that God’s good world is not as it should be. We are not as we should be.

Jesus entered our world of violence and lived into a story that contradicted the lie that death is in charge. Jesus saw reality the way God saw it; he could see something deeper than our collective human experience and conviction about death. He proclaimed this message and invited us to live into it. Therefore, we must resist the pull to live into a false narrative of retribution and heroic violence. We must resist the story death proclaims by grieving its widespread acceptance and condemning it as vanity. We resist death by taking up arms of communal prayer, self sacrifice, lament, and gospel hope, but never with weapons of worldly means. Churches that use guns for self protection acquiesce to the spirit of this age.

If we begin to accept armed protection as a legitimate means we deny the One we claim to follow. By accepting armed protection, we move into a false narrative that says self protection, even at the expense of taking life, is compatible, justifiable, and reasonable with enemy love. We deny the very story that has changed the world, and we live as if the new has not come and as if the old is not already passing away.

And what is a posting on this blog without mentioning books?! Here are a pair: Wade Burleson on the value of books and reading. He takes special aim at television, but I would include binge-watching in that category.

But, be careful about setting a goal of XX books this year, as this person discovered:

Finding myself in the middle of a book I never want to end is among the greatest joys of reading. I live for the desire to finish a book in one sitting, and the competing desire to slow down and make the pleasure last. Sadly, I robbed myself that pleasure this year. I blew through everything I read, including books I would’ve dragged out for weeks just to live in their worlds a little longer.

Today’s habit-happy productivity culture advocates for setting measurable, attainable goals. Finishing what we start is considered a victory. But our reading lives shouldn’t depend on filling in a Goodreads progress bar. That’s because reading isn’t just any old habit to track.

Yep. I've never really measured how many books I read each year. I've also never felt bad about abandoning a book that didn't interest me. I've also been wrestling my way through some books for a few years. For example, I'm about 2/3 through an introduction to cognitive linguistics that I started over 3 years ago. By the time I finish it, I'll need to go back and read it again!

OK, that's it for this week. Good reading!

Uh-oh! There's that early high christology again!

While Christocentric in focus, the view of Jesus promoted in these passages is deeply rooted in a Jewish conception of the divine, so much so that Jesus is shown to be worthy of receiving the honor that was due in early Judaism to the one true God. In light of this it was not surprising to see that these early christological hymns were creatively and critically engaged with Jewish scripural traditions. One way they reflect this is through their engagement with passages of Scripture relating to prophetic promises of renewal and restoration, particularly as seen in Isaiah 40-66. Scriptures relating to the glory of God, the temple, and personified Wisdom also are important in many of the hymns we examined. The New Testament christological hymns also seem to have maintained a meaningful connection to the Jewish psalm tradition, a tradition that was alive and well during the Second Temple period. These early christological hymns thereby show themselves to be connected to a living tradition of psalm composition and religious poetry, a genre that itself had a long pedigree of engaging culture, drawing on even earlier traditions, and resisting easy answers to the problem of suffering.—Matthew Gordley, New Testament Christological Hymns, p. 223

Christocentric worship

To begin with, it is clear that early Christian worship was centered on Christ. This conclusion seems not at all surprising or even all that interesting given that I have chosen here to explore christological hymns. Still, the fact that the early Christian milieu was generative of passages that offer hymnic declarations about Christ in elevated style and poetic form is foundational for this study. In a range of ways these passages invite readers to embrace a particular view of reality centered on the events surrounding the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. I suggest that it is not these hymnic passages alone that give rise to this dynamic. What we know of early Christian worship as a whole indicates that much of it was similarly centered on Christ. Though we have little direct evidence of early Christian worship, there are good reasons to see these passages as a reflection of an already widespread emphasis on the centrality of Christ among these communities. Apart from the existence of such a prevalent christological perspective within the Christian communities, it is difficult to imagine a scenario that would result in such diverse yet related Christ-centered passages with hymnic features embedded throughout the New Testament writings.—Matthew Gordley, New Testament Christological Hymns, 222–23

<idle musing>
Sadly, I fear that is not the case in what passes for Christian worship today. A deadly mixture of me-centered, tuneless songs, repeated ad nauseum, followed by a sermon that most frequently is devoid of any scriptural foundation, if not outright heresy. And don't forget about the flag worship and the rampant nationalism.

How the mighty have fallen. Lord, have mercy!
</idle musing>

The lamb on the throne

Interestingly, as Steven Friesen [Imperial Cults and the Apocalypse of John, 198] notes, “John did not attempt to work out the relationship between the Lamb and the One on the throne through discussions of ontology or through abstract reasoning. His vision report works through the logic of worship and of apocalyptic symbol.” In this light, the strategic inclusion of hymnic praise is one means that John uses to paint a vision of past, present, and future in which the Christians of Asia Minor can locate themselves, form their communal identity, and live accordingly as worshipers of God and the Lamb.—Matthew Gordley, New Testament Christological Hymns, p. 215

Thought for the day

People are not really rational animals. We are herd animals who are primarily driven by our emotions. This is true of the academy as well, although we do a better job pretending that it is all about the logic. Those who expect people to behave rationally are bound for frequent disappointment. Those of us committed to the quest for true objectivity are few and far between.—Ken Schenck

Tool of subjugation, or tool of freedom?

Here the present experience of the [Ephesian] community is in view and explicitly identified as one in which a former state of hostility has now been replaced by a state of peace and unity through the reconciling work of Christ. As we saw in the examination of Colossians, this peacemaking and reconciling was an accomplishment for which the Roman emperor was praised. Interestingly, here the Roman tool for subjugation of its enemies and the enforcement of peace among its conquered peoples, the cross, is the same tool through which Christ accomplishes his peacemaking work. As with the explicit mention of the cross in the Philippian and Colossian hymns, there may be a reference to Rome’s power here as well. The extent to which the Ephesians were presently experiencing the peace and unity that Christ’s death had made possible, or whether this was part of the author’s case for pursuing such unity, is an open question. But it is clear that the hymnic passage with its emphasis on unity has immediate application for the community (see Eph 4:3-16).—Matthew Gordley, New Testament Christological Hymns, pp. 182–83

As promised, feel good academic stories

Last Saturday I said I would hopefully share some feel-good academic stories. Well, here are two from my days in graduate school.

As those of you who have done graduate work can attest, it can be a pressure cooker of stress. Between the intensity of the work and the financial strain of limited income, one sometimes feels overwhelmed. And sometimes you feel like a professor is gunning for you, or just doesn't care. Certain professors get reputations of being mean and impersonal, sometimes rightfully so, sometimes just because they have very high standards and that comes across as mean and uncaring. OK. Enough background. Here are two from my experiences, and a bonus that was told to me by one of my graduate professors.

I was in my second year of my Classics masters program at the University of Kentucky. Debbie was pregnant with Ryan and the morning sickness was pretty severe. Our cash was stretched to the breaking point. I had a TA position teaching first year Latin. I don't know how it works now, but in those days, TAs got in-state reduced tuition, not free tuition. And they required the tuition to be paid the month before the term started. It was December, and I didn't have the money for the tuition. I would get the extra cash two weeks after the deadline. I was wondering out loud to the department secretary, Sharon, what I was going to do when one of the Classics professors walked in. He heard what I was saying and offered to loan me the money to pay the tuition! I could pay him back in January, when classes started again. Talk about an early Christmas present!

The second story is set in Chicago, during my second year there. We lived in married student housing, just south of the Midway. We were in the habit of walking then, just as we are now. We would load the kids up in the wagon and pull them around the quads every evening. They would get out and walk some of the way, but mostly they rode. Occasionally, we would extend the walk to go to the store. At that time in Hyde Park there was a family-owned grocery on 56th or 57th Street. One January evening, with the temperatures in the zero degree range and falling (along with some snow), we walked to the store to get milk. On the return trip, about a block or so from the store, a car slowed down. The driver rolled the window down and called out my name, asking if we wanted a ride home. It was one of the toughest professors at the OI! He had a reputation of being extremely tough and students were scared of him. We turned him down because we're from Minnesota : ) But that offer meant more to me than I can explain.

OK. Final story. This was relayed to me by the ancient history professor at the University of Kentucky when I was there. He was a graduate student under Chester Starr back in the early 1960s. For those of you who don't know, Chester Starr was probably the best Classics history person in that time period. My professor was his graduate assistant. He told me that about once a week or so, Starr would throw him the keys to his Mercedes and tell him to take a drive. Starr said that he looked strained and might enjoy the break of driving a luxury vehicle.

Merry Christmas! Even Scrooge can be nice : )

He's not even mentioned!

For all of the empire’s grand claims for the emperor, he is not worthy even to be named but only to take his place in the shadow of the exalted Jesus of the Johannine prologue. Readers of John's Gospel are invited to embrace this exalted view of Jesus. As they encounter the words and works of Jesus in the Gospel narrative they are prepared by the prologue to understand that the work of Jesus as agent of God had its origins in the mythic past, before Rome, before Moses, before Abraham—“in the beginning.”—Matthew Gordley, New Testament Christological Hymns, p. 177

In case you've been living under a rock this last week...

Christianity Today published an op-ed endorsing impeachment and removal of the current president. All that needs to be said was in that op-ed. Of course, the resulting onslaught of criticism is to be expected. When you put your hope in an idol, any idol, and that idol gets attacked, you fight back, right? That's what the Israelites did when Jeremiah confronted them. That's what happened to Amos when he confronted the Northern Kingdom. Of course, that doesn't make it any fun for the ones being attacked. Here's the final paragraph of the editorial:

We have reserved judgment on Mr. Trump for years now. Some have criticized us for our reserve. But when it comes to condemning the behavior of another, patient charity must come first. So we have done our best to give evangelical Trump supporters their due, to try to understand their point of view, to see the prudential nature of so many political decisions they have made regarding Mr. Trump. To use an old cliché, it’s time to call a spade a spade, to say that no matter how many hands we win in this political poker game, we are playing with a stacked deck of gross immorality and ethical incompetence. And just when we think it’s time to push all our chips to the center of the table, that’s when the whole game will come crashing down. It will crash down on the reputation of evangelical religion and on the world’s understanding of the gospel. And it will come crashing down on a nation of men and women whose welfare is also our concern.

Well said. Yes, I wish they had taken a stand years ago, but at least they did it now. Galli is well-aware that it probably won't make a difference in the general evangelical population. CT has always been a magazine for the evangelicals who tend to be more intellectually inclined.

Here's a couple responses that I would consider balanced: The Atlantic; John Fea has had numerous posts, but this one sums up the hypocrisy of certain "court evangelicals". I could link to others, such as Warren Throckmorton, but you get the idea.

The Anxious Bench reflects on Ron Sider and his influence. Summary statement at the end: "Ron Sider is still trying to evangelize the evangelicals."

Meanwhile, someone raised evangelical reflects on that heritage. Worth pondering. In my experience, people are always receptive to bringing up church history, the church fathers, etc. when explaining why a certain doctrine is the way it is, and why another one is incorrect. What they won't tolerate, though, is when I start drawing conclusions on how we should live based on those doctrines. In other words, keep it in the mind and you are fine. Touch my stuff, and you are in serious trouble. That seems to be a recurring theme, doesn't it? Genesis 3 anyone?

Speaking of that, remember the Wheaton professor who wore a hijab? Remember her name? I didn't think so; neither did I, but her life is slowly being put back together. A documentary is being made. Read the article for a small taste of what it must be like to be an Afro-American woman at an evangelical school who dares to say something less than acceptable to the alumni. Remember, for small evangelical schools, the alumni are what keeps the school afloat. As high as the tuition is at those schools, that doesn't pay the bills. Not even close. And the endowments aren't huge. I know; I went to one: Asbury College (now University). And over the years, I've watched the alumni at other small schools force those schools to give "the left boot of fellowship" to professors who said things they didn't like. Didn't matter whether what they said was true or not. Of course that shouldn't surprise us, should it? The Old Testament prophets wouldn't win any popularity contests, would they?

But the US evangelical scene isn't the only evangelical scene in disarray. Brexit, the never coming, never going away issue for the (un)United Kingdom has evangelicals there in disagreement.

And speaking of the UK, my favorite Classicist, who happens to have been born on my birthday (only a few years earlier), Mary Beard, reflects on the current status of higher education. Many good points there; do read it.

As long as we're in academia, how about a feel-good piece? Times Higher Education (THE) asks "Is there still a place for kindness in today’s harsh academic environment?" And then gives personal testimonies by academics on how little acts of kindness went a long way when they were just starting out. I'll have more to say on that next week (I hope) as I recount a couple from my past. Meanwhile, be sure to check it out; here's a taste:

This act of academic kindness occurred some years ago, but I only heard about it recently, from its beneficiary. She was teaching part-time at my university when, at short notice and in the middle of the marking season, she was shortlisted for a full-time post at another institution. Two of my colleagues—one a full-time lecturer, the other part-time herself—took all her marking off her so that she had time to prepare for her presentation and interview.

In their book On Kindness (2009), Adam Phillips and Barbara Taylor argue that kindness is now seen as “a virtue of losers”. They attribute this to the ascendancy of free-market individualism, which has cultivated competitiveness and mistrust and led to “a life of overwork, anxiety, and isolation”.

If they are right, then kindness should also be endangered within the university. The new managerialism urges us to see ourselves as hard-nosed entrepreneurs competing for awards, grants and research time, while also making us feel that no amount of success will ever appease the gods of compliance. It makes the modern university not so much a cruel as a callous place, one where feeling harassed and stressed makes us thoughtless and self-absorbed. We are rarely unkind on purpose, but being unkind by accident usually has the same effect.

What is remarkable, though, is the doggedness of our desire to be kind. There is still room in academia for what A.H. Halsey, in The Decline of Donnish Dominion (1992), calls “commensality”, which literally means sharing a table and which he uses to mean that intangible sense of collegiality on which we thrive. Universities would grind to a halt without these millions of small, inconspicuous acts of goodwill.

On that same hopeful note, here is a nice advent meditation. A small excerpt, but it's a short enough piece you should read the whole thing:

Instead, Jesus completely disregarded the idea that the woman or himself were defiled, inherently capable of defiling others, or needed separation from others. The woman wasn’t an obstacle to overcome on his way to arguably more important tasks, nor was she an object of defilement he had to protect himself from. Jesus instead acknowledged and blessed her publicly then went on his way unflustered, undeterred.

Paranoid? Think you are being followed? Well, you probably are, but it's that smartphone in your pocket that's doing the following. And the data are being monetized to target you with ads for stuff you don't need, but probably think you want. Read this. Of course, I doubt you'll give up your phone (I won't), but at least consider turning off tracking on as many apps as you can. And, remember that the ads you see are designed to own you. You read that right. They aren't just trying to part with your money; they want your soul. They want you to buy into the lie that without stuff you are less a human.

OK. This is getting long, but I have three more links, all tied to bad practices by the current administration (and in one case, the past two administrations):

You've been lied to about the war in Afghanistan. OK, you already knew that, or at least suspected it. But the real crime is

The lack of accurate statistics should bother us, just as the misrepresentation of them should disturb us even more. But the greatest outrage over these numbers is the fact that the United States never seriously considered that they needed to document the loss of Afghan lives in the first place.

We need to stop and pause at this reality because within it is the entire reason why the war has become the disaster that it is today. The United States never cared about counting the bodies of dead Afghans caused by the war they started. They didn’t count the dead, they didn’t count the wounded, and they didn’t count the displaced or traumatized.

They didn’t count the Afghans because the Afghans didn’t count.

As Christians, that should bother us. 'Nuff said there. Next, the new rules about sexual assault on campuses. What? I can't even begin to describe how wrong that is. Ask any rape counsellor about that idea. Want the number of reported assaults to go down without actually doing anything to prevent them (and possibly even encouraging more!)? They just wrote the ticket.

Final link. The FCC is stealing part of the radio spectrum set aside for improving car, bicycle, and pedestrian safety and giving it to, wait for it, Facebook and other commercial entities. As if you don't already check your Facebook status too much! Here are the bullet points, but read the whole article for more details:

The FCC recently announced it was reducing the airwave spectrum for vehicle-to-vehicle communication in cars.

This technology is supposed to reduce the amount of car wrecks by communicating from car to car things like speed, acceleration, hard braking, and red lights.

The move could set back the forward movement of vehicle-to-vehicle or vehicle-to-infrastructure communication in the U.S.

On that note, I'll end. This world is a mess, but Jesus is the hope. Someday, he will come back and set things straight, but in the meantime, we are called to live in love to our neighbors, praying for them and assisting them. All this can only happen by the power of the Holy Spirit living within us and through us. Don't forget that and fall into self-righteousness and pride—or despair that you don't reach some goal.

So, is he or is he not?

Finally, does the prologue suggest that Jesus is the appropriate object of worship? In key places in the Gospel, a growing understanding of the identity of Jesus leads to belief in him, or in his name, and also to worship (e.g., the man born blind). Thomas’s confession is the climactic expression of a clarified understanding of Jesus’ identity: “My Lord and my God!” (Jn 20:28). This belief in Jesus is what is already espoused in the prologue. The prologue constitutes a confession of Jesus as uniquely participating in the divine (Jn 1:1-2), the source of light and life (Jn 1:3-5), revealing God’s glory in his flesh (Jn 1:14), and the source of grace and truth (Jn 1:16-17). Recognizing that other Second Temple—period psalms embody the worshipful result that their authors promote (e.g., Sir 39:12-35; 4Q437; Pss. Sol.), it is not a stretch to imagine that the prologue itself reflects this same dynamic.” The prologue embodies the confession of an appropriate response by one who has seen God’s glory in Jesus and become a child of God. As a hymnic confession it models for the reader an appropriate response of worship. Even if not a preformed hymn itself, it nevertheless reflects the kinds of acclamations of praise that were the appropriate response of the community to the presence of the risen Jesus among them. The prologue does not tell us about early Christian worship; rather, it invites us into the narrative about Jesus and models a confessional response to the revelation of the glory of God in Jesus.—Matthew Gordley, New Testament Christological Hymns, pp. 175–76 (emphasis original)

"…and dwelt among us."

The [Johannine] prologue itself touches on each of these aspects of worship, at least to a certain degree. First, the tabernacle imagery, related to the tent and to the glory of God, raises the issue of the location and focus of worship. Connections between the Greek verb skenoō and biblical passages such as Exodus 27:21, Leviticus 1:1, and Numbers 1:1 have been long noted. D. Moody Smith captures the connection with the verb skenoō and explains, “The very word suggests a subtle but important theme of the prologue and of the gospel, namely, that Jesus will become the place where the people will meet God, displacing the tent and its successor, the Jerusalem temple (cf. 2:19-21; 4:20-24).” [John, ANTC, 59] The glory of God is to be seen in Jesus (Jn 1:14), and Jesus is revealed to be the location and focal point of worship. This perspective is not unlike what we saw in Colossians regarding the dwelling of the fullness of God in Christ as a reference to the temple.—Matthew Gordley, New Testament Christological Hymns, p. 175

Around the interlinks

If you are looking for comments on the happenings in Washington yesterday, look elsewhere. That said, is the church in a slumber? This RNS article thinks so:

Regardless of how you think about these movements [past awakenings/revivals] in American Christianity or how you divvy them up, the important point for our purposes is that despite their seemingly conservative religious bent — steeped in rhetoric of sin and redemption — there was, with notable exceptions, often enough a progressive moral, social and political agenda for its time.

How odd, then, that the current custodians of the evangelical movements would be seen, rightly this author judges, as anything but progressive and in fact stunting the work of churches to labor for greater freedom, inclusion, aid and equality of people as marks of a robust religiousness. Maybe the millennials are seeing what too many Christians are not.

Is it possible that we are living through “The Great American Slumber,” a time when too many churches are not pressing for the reform of the nation but lining their pockets, becoming court evangelicals and traveling around by private jets? Are these churches asleep while the youth of the nation are “woke?”

And what about all these continued assaults on the Salvation Army?

The first thing to know about the Salvation Army is that it is a church, founded by the Methodist preacher William Booth. He started his Salvation Army, with military ranks for its clergy, to reach the hungry and the needy through service. With more than 1.5 million members and a presence in roughly 130 countries, it is a spectacular example of, as Billy Graham once put it, “Christianity in action.”

As such, it obviously reflects Christian morality. “Soldiers, the core group among members,” one religious writer explained, “take covenant vows that cover doctrine, loyalty, willingness to evangelize and help the needy, and clean living (no alcohol, drugs, gambling, pornography or profanity).” The army’s position that marriage should be between a man and a woman isn’t an exotic invention, but standard Christian teaching.

The idea that the Salvation Army has an anti-gay animus stems largely from its opposition to anti-discrimination laws that it worried would impinge on its conscience rights, and criticism over its policies regarding transgender people (especially the practice of some places of assigning people to male or female facilities depending on their gender at birth). The organization has made clear again and again, though, that its services are available to all.

Commenting on the scandalous Buttigieg bell-ringing images, the press secretary for the left-wing Alliance for Justice opined, “I know the photos are two years old, but still, I can’t help but wonder if Mayor Pete just looks at what LGBTQ activists have been working on for years and then chooses to spite it.” Or perhaps he was rational and broad-minded enough to appreciate the massive good done by one of the most admirable institutions in the country.

'Nuff said.

Heard about the latest example of our national love affair with fast cars? Bicycling magazine has this:

103 mph. That’s how fast three drivers recently went as they crossed the country in their successful attempt to break the informal “Cannonball Run” record for fastest crossing of the contiguous United States. The time: 27 hours and 25 minutes.

That 103 mph is not a top speed; it’s an average speed. And everything about the attempt—from the meticulous preparations designed not only to maximize efficiency but evade law enforcement, to how it’s being covered in the media—is a striking example of the slavish devotion we have to cars in this country, safety be damned.. . .

It’s clear that the drivers in the most recent attempt don’t fear punishment. They weren’t caught in the act, and while they’ve admitted flagrant speeding, and telematics from both the vehicle and the GPS systems they used would provide incontrovertible evidence, I don’t expect any enterprising prosecutor to subpoena that information.

Everything about the Cannonball Run, from its entitled, narcissistic beginnings to how we talk about it, exemplifies the worst excesses of car culture in this country. Maybe once, in some America of long ago, it had a purpose, but that’s gone now. It’s time for the Cannonball Run to die, before someone does.

Glad I wasn't on a bike when they went whizzing past. Or walking.

Shifting gears a bit, Ron Sider talks about the absurdity of Christmas:

The early Christians ran around the most powerful empire of the time saying their leader was in charge of the world.

To see the patent absurdity of this claim, just remember that the Roman empire at that time was perhaps more dominant over a huge part of the earth than any empire until America after the collapse of the Soviet Union. And this vast overwhelmingly powerful Roman empire was ruled by the almighty (divine) Caesar. The Romans had the best army in the world and they enforced Roman rule—ruthlessly!

Do read the rest for more perspective. Speaking of absurd, how about the guy who registered his bees as a service animal?

On a more serious note, a Scandinavian author takes on Nobel Prize winner Handke's Bosnian writings. Long read, but worth the effort.

And while we are on the theme of mass murder, the Houston police chief had a few choice words on the NRA, the GOP, and (lack of) gun control.

"You're either here for women and children and our daughters and our sisters and our aunts, or you're here for the NRA," Acevedo said. "So I don't want to see their little smug faces talking about how much they care about law enforcement when I'm burying a sergeant because they don't want to piss off the NRA.

"Make up your minds," he said. "Whose side are you on? Gun manufacturers? The gun lobby? Or the children that are getting gunned down in this country every single day?"

Too simplistic? Maybe. But if you want to stop the murders, maybe it's time to get simplistic.

Speaking of simplistic, that seems to be the order of the day when it comes to evangelicals and the unwavering support of #45. Warren Throckmorton, no liberal in anybody's book, has this to say about the recent "worship leaders" convergence on Washington:

In October, no refugees were settled in the U.S. for the first time since the 1980s. There is an ongoing humanitarian crisis happening at our Southern border. Recently, a migrant teen boy died of the flu while in custody of U.S. Border Patrol. I could go on to discuss the Kurds and the faith community there that Trump left to be slaughtered by the Turks.

There is reason to believe the Administration’s rhetoric on human trafficking is faulty. Many of their policies toward migrants and refugees actually make trafficking worse. But because Christian leaders have stars in their eyes, they won’t challenge what they are being told or do any independent research. Because Trump and Pompeo say it, it must be true.

Christians are supposed to be monotheists. However, in the age of Trump, there are two gods in many of their lives, and as I have written before, Trump shall have the preeminence.

Along those lines of what a person is worth, Stephen McAlpine, an Australian blogger, muses on the recent euthanasia bill in his Australian state:

A signed off euthanasia bill—one of the most radical and invasive in the nation—may bring glee to the faces of its most vocal proponents, but the heart-aching decline of my dad that we allowed to occur, despite our misgivings and pain—brought grace to our hearts. I totally understand the heartache and despair of seeing a loved one die terribly. Indeed I see the challenge it presents to me, should I suffer a similar or worse pathway to death when it comes, as it inevitably will.

Yet, leaving that aside, if you have to choose between glee and grace in this increasingly graceless culture, then choose grace every time. Even if it means giving up some other choice or right that you wish to impose either on yourself or on others.

Speaking of grace, here is a thoughtful piece on Bonhoeffer by five different scholars. Read it!

On the happenings on the other side of the pond, Philip Jenkins asks how nations disappear. He is of the opinion, as an ex-pat, that the United Kingdom is about to disintegrate:

In some ways, this takes us back to the Middle Ages, when Europe’s nations were such fragile things, adding to people’s need for a higher religious loyalty. That is why they turned so readily to “Christendom,” the Res Publica Christiana, a true overarching unity and a focus of loyalty transcending mere kingdoms or empires. Kingdoms such as Burgundy, Wessex, or Saxony might last for only a century or two before they were replaced by new states and dynasties, but any rational person knew that Christendom simply endured. We grew up thinking we lived in a very different kind of modernity, based on the nation state – but maybe we don’t, and perhaps we never really did.

Nations are imagined communities, and sometime they unimagine themselves. It can happen very quickly. Thank heaven the United States could never evaporate like the United Kingdom seems to be doing. Well …

Shifting gears a bit, I'm familiar with the backstory on "O Holy Night," but I had never before read the literal translation of the French original. Mike Frost has it. And it's even more powerful than the version we sing. Take a look at what reading the Gospel of Luke can do for you. Careful! You might be forced to modify your opinions on things! But, as N.T. Wright observes (somewhere!), the Gospels are powerful weapons.

Another long read, but definitely worth the time, is this look at the dramatic increase in the number of kids (boys especially) diagnosed with ADHD. Here's the intro, but don't avoid the whole article; it doesn't deny that ADHD exists, it looks at how we got where we are and if there are alternatives to drugs (hint: there are, but it requires time and energy):

By the time they reach high school, nearly 20 percent of all American boys will be diagnosed with ADHD. Millions of those boys will be prescribed a powerful stimulant to "normalize" them. A great many of those boys will suffer serious side effects from those drugs. The shocking truth is that many of those diagnoses are wrong, and that most of those boys are being drugged for no good reason—simply for being boys. It's time we recognize this as a crisis.

Meanwhile, at the Scholar's Kitchen, David Crotty reflects on the loss of shared cultural moments.

This, and other things I've been reading lately lead me to ask: Are we losing too much in a digital world? Can we retain the good while mitigating the bad? I don't know the answer to that, but I leave you to ponder it as we continue through Advent and approach Christmas.

For those who have ears to hear!

Sir. 13:1    Whoever touches tar will get dirty,

and those who associate with the arrogant will become like them.

² Don’t lift something

that’s too heavy for you,

and don’t associate with people

who are more powerful and rich

than you are.

What does a clay pot have in common

with a metal cauldron?

The one will knock against the other

and be shattered.

³ Rich people inflict injury,

but then act as if they’re the ones

who have been wronged;

the poor suffer injury,

but they’re the ones

who must apologize.

⁴ If you are useful to the rich,

they will work with you,

but if you are in need,

they will abandon you.

⁵ If you own anything,

they will live with you;

they will exhaust what you have,

and they won’t suffer.

⁶ If they need you, they will deceive you

and smile at you and give you hope;

they will speak nicely to you and say,

“What do you need?”

⁷ They will embarrass you

with their fine foods,

until they have cleaned you out

two or three times over.

In the end they will mock you,

and after these things,

they will see you and abandon you

and shake their heads at you. (CEV)

But it's already here!

The [Johannine] prologue’s focus seems to be almost entirely on the latter notion (renewal) rather than on the former (judgment). Its focus also concerns more the past (remembering history) and the present (shaping identity) than the future. This is not to say that prologue does not suggest a particular vision of the future. It does. However, it is a future that is based on the present reality that the community is already experiencing. In theological terms, it is a realized eschatology. The community does not need to wait to see the glory of the exalted Jesus before whom every knee will bow and every tongue acknowledge his lordship (Phil 2:10). That glory has already been revealed in the recent past and the present: “we have seen his glory” (Jn 1:14). As Raymond Brown puts it, “The Gospel very clearly regards the coming of Jesus as an eschatological event which marked the change of the aeons.”—Matthew Gordley, New Testament Christological Hymns, pp. 171–72