John 15:26 - 16:15
Pentecost - Year B
"Trinity" - Year C
John 15:26-27; 16:4b-15
We are called to extend the revelation of G*D, through Jesus, into the future. This can't simply be a carrying forward any particular past revelation, but a continuing one. This is part of the arguments of the day. Was revelation complete at some previous moment and now it is simply a matter of repeating that or are there things that are now self-evident to the body that were not so previously.
While it seems clear that we have made a change in the inclusions of life (divine right of kings, slavery, some of the gender issues) there are still folks who don't get it. At issue here how much of this you see to be plural and how much singular. The Spirit is generally not privately possessed, though that is the case for prophets.
For instance, the church has yet to change its mind on GLBT matters as it has on slavery and women issues of relatively recent times. We cannot claim that the Spirit is only communal for the community does get stuck with viewpoints just this side of bearable. At the same time we cannot claim everything that runs counter to the communal spirit is and expression of some larger truth.
Both individuals and communities need the peace and courage to be clear about the risks involved with change and be willing to take a good many of them. Here we come to "Here I stand!" moments when we can do no other. Here we come to listening beyond our circumstance and confessing we had gotten it wrong.
Let's keep incarnational theology alive by fearfully and tremblingly listening and acting.
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Thomas (Reader)
Re: the John 15 passage referred to above, and in particular the comment that begins "We are called to extend the revelation of G*D..."
I recall that most of the early christian groups, including those planted by Paul, leaned toward an apocalyptic theology that was also strongly proleptic: in particular, the Johannine communities had a clear sense of "already/not yet" and so it would not be so much a matter of extending revelation, as one might "extend" the ripples made by a rock splashing into a calm pond.
It would seem to be more a matter of looking ahead to the "not yet" event which draws us into a future not yet unfolded but growing stronger in its unfoldment as each day passes. I find this far more promising (and exciting) than simply trying to ride out the wave created by some revelatory event a couple millenia ago. I am convinced that this "drawing into a future event/time" is what de Chardin had in mind when he wrote about omega point. And the nifty point is that the "not yet" of an unfolded/revealed future is "already" present as possibilities in each current moment, much as the growth and development of an acorn into an oak tree is already encoded in its dna. The acorn knows how to grow.
Our most important task might just be to make sure the squirrels don't get all the acorns.
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Wesley (Blogger)
Ah, the old push-me-pull-you from Dr. Dolittle. Is the past pushing us forward that it might be fulfilled (a lot of Nikos Kazantzakis in this) as well as the future pulling us toward it that it, too, might be fulfilled (de Chardin, et. al.)? And around and around we go. Generally I prefer the pulling method but periodically I do appreciate a push. Thanks for pushing me to pull again.
This conversation got me to thinking again about Nikos. Thanks. A couple of longish articles are found at Modern Parables of Sacredness & Profanity [MISSING URL] and Uphill Path.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2003/june2003.html
What we have experienced is going away. Woe is ours.
What we have yet to experience is to our advantage. Joy is ours.
Between these two we wrestle with sin. We have experienced it as moral categories; we will experience it in the quality of our relationship with Emmanuel (connecting us with everything - a variation on a theory of everything?).
Between these two we wrestle with righteousness. We have experienced it as legally binding; we will experience it as a wholeness or completedness through larger living.
Between these two we will wrestle with judgment. We have experienced it as tit-for-tat retribution, or worse; we will experience it as mercifully restorative in moving beyond temporary boundaries.
Happy betweening.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2003/june2003.html
Can't you just wait to be proved wrong about sin, righteousness and judgment?
If you had to locate three key arenas of life that need to be revisited and revisioned, would they be these three or others? Sometimes our identification of the key issues of life can sharpen our responses.
Here is one way to look at these three.
1. Sin: not believing in a journey of Jesus toward compassion, kindness.
2. Righteous: being on a journey with Jesus toward compassion, kindness.
3. Judgment: reflection on and course changes through a journey with Jesus toward compassion, kindness.
Having identified the issues, can we we get on with a closer approximation of our lives with their view of G*D (The Compassionate One)?
[Note: This posting was stimulated by Karen Armstrong's latest book about an Axial Age and the Golden Rule - The Sunday Times gives one of many synopses of her work at http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,27709-2075414,00.html.]
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2006/june2006.html
If we consider the elided material, Jesus is saying some stuff intended to keep us from stumbling. Of course, intentions have yet to not go astray.
At any rate, here comes some new stuff that is just as problematic as the older stuff. If we are trinitarian how do we deal with Jesus going away in order that a helping advocate come. Is there some spiritual law that only one of the three can be present at any given time? Is Jesus such a powerful personality and the Advocate such a shy one that Jesus not only outshines the sun, but the Holy Spirit?
Further, is it merely one more repetition that is keeping us from understanding sin, righteousness, and judgment? If we didn't get it with Jesus, what makes anyone think we'll get it with a Spirit Holy? Isn't this somewhat akin to jumping off the temple to showboat power.
If we are trinitarian how do we deal with a Holy Spirit that is a simple non-physical presence of Jesus, not having anything of its own to offer?
Ya gotta love John and his imagery of nesting dolls -- smallest doll is G*D (all that G*D's got is mine, inside me); middle doll is Jesus calling the shots; largest doll is Spirit Holy, Jesus' aura, Jesus' force-field.
How would you talk about the relationship of your faith development? Are you a doll smaller than G*D or larger than Spirit?
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Thomas (Reader)
So what happens if we scrap "trinitarian?"
It is a dead metaphor. Van Bogard Dunn said that exact thing: "Trinity is a dead metaphor and he said it way back in 1989 or 1990 at School for Ministry (aka Pastor's School), Wisconsin Conference UMC.
Van Bogard Dunn is dead now (pity, few have the intestinal fortitude he had), but his words have rung true for me ever since he spoke them with courage and conviction:
Trinity is a dead metaphor.
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Anonymous (Reader)
Interesting website with a lot of resources and detailed explanations.
http://www.kairoscomotion.org/lectionary/2006/june2006.html
There are many things yet to be learned but they are beyond our current bearing of them. Until we can come to grips with this basic understanding of more to be learned - bones remain dry, labor pains continue, and we remain trapped in our current-sized room repeating ourselves in a single language to one another.
A needed breath of new creation, a new spirit, is needed as catalyst to transform what we don't know into an important category of life and renewal for us. Without this we are dusty dust, groaning groaners, sorrowing sorrowers.
Continuing the oneness image of I in you and you in them, the new comes to the old, unbidden. Consider this as a definition of Glory as well as an expression of Grace.
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step out in faith with fear and trembling
a new vision comes beyond what we knowcast a new vision beyond what is yet known
fear and trembling become solid enough to stand on
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2007_05_01_archive.html
Going away is so unhandy to our plans based on our current reality. Whether it is Jesus, friend, lover, or enemy – their going away throws us for a loop. Yet, if we don't have some experience of loss, how will we recognize a new opportunity? Arrgh, what a system and what it says about a G*D in our image.
To be blessed by loss is to be open to revisiting our present anew and seeing what we might have gotten awry and what really needs to continue on for a bit. Could we have gotten the whole sin thing wrong (it's not about flesh, but spirit)? Could we have gotten the whole righteousness thing wrong (its not ours to achieve or G*D's to give)? Could we have gotten the whole judgment thing wrong (its not relative or absolute)? Could we have gotten the limits of our knowledge wrong (its not about either the traditions or what we can handle right now)? Could we have gotten glory wrong (its ours by virtue of another or it stands in eternity)?
When we become friends, not servants, we return to the flow of life, of grace – not based on our current creedal understanding but catching clearer glimpses of the Great Better continuing to inch its way into the present and taking root. This shift from the limits of what we already know to an inbreaking of a growing edge can make a helpful difference for us and for others.
So here is the set up for the week – waiting, in the midst of loss, for new and renewed friendship to gel and be released, to gel and be released, to be acted on and lost, to be and not to be – acting, in the midst of loss, of our own power and control, our own strengths and weaknesses, acceptance or rejection by others.
Wait and Act. Enjoy the wrestling.
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2009_05_01_archive.html
We participate in Pentecost when we learn from Spirit, "There is more to life than hiding away."
We participate in Pentecost when we teach Spirit to others, "There is more to life than hiding away."
These parallel pieces of wisdom help keep us on track when difficulties and temptations come to return to hiding. They are the internal and external aspects of moving from plateau to plateau; moving from more life to yet more life.
Regardless of how things go bump in the night and we sense we are abandoned, we remind each other of these key pieces of wisdom.
So, this is practice time. Will you keep moving on without your own personal trainer (incarnate Jesus or instructor Spirit)? Will you keep moving on without your initial inspiration? Will you stop judging; in the arc of justice you know where things are going, so just get on with living your expectations.
Pentecost is not a one time deal. It is time to learn a next lesson, to catch a new vision, and to engage strangers.
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2010/05/john-1526-1615.html
Between "...none of you asks me, "Where are you going?"" and "I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now....the spirit of truth...will declare to you the things that are to come" are questions of sin and righteousness. What is sin? What is righteousness? What does Jesus' journey have to do with making a judgment about such?
These are questions that are fraught with uncertainty. Our limited vision has proved to be wrong, time after time. Why would we think that suddenly we are now getting it right?
If we are so consistently short-sighted about sin, continually thinking it has to do with our particular aversions, might we not need to put the idea of sin down for a while? If we have such variation in what it is that G*D desires, developing one creed after another, might we not need to set categorical righteousness aside for a bit. In both cases we will probably find ourselves sliding back into some meta-wrongs and meta-rights, but we may also be able to see them anew - with all their glorious limitations in addition to their aspirations to ultimacy.
How did the world get sin wrong? Perhaps we hear here that Jesus is not really about sin but determining what is trustworthy and following wherever that leads.
How did the world get righteousness wrong? Perhaps we need to hear that it isn't about moments of revelation but a larger journey toward joining with G*D in a healthy way and it is unhelpful to do agreed upon righteousness when we might simply connect self with creation.
How did the world get judgment wrong? Perhaps we need to hear that judgment is not about right and wrong, something Satan loves to confuse, but about how well our current behavior accords with healthier living. Judgment is not so much between A and B (though that is a helpful marketing, design tool) as it is comparing both to C.
It is time to consider again whether or not our current judgments about sin and righteousness are getting in the way of developing healthy temperaments.
http://kcmlection.blogspot.com/2012/05/john-1526-27-164b-15.html