Jesus, love and friendship

¹² “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. ¹³ No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. ¹⁴ You are my friends if you do what I command you. ¹⁵ I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. ¹⁶ You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. ¹⁷ I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another. (NRSV)

Last post I looked at the idea that we are friends of Jesus, not simply his slaves or servants, and that this should shape how we view everything about our "relationship with God". This is not an overly sentimentalised view, nor entirely egalitarian, yet nonetheless intimate. We are the ones possessing knowledge of the purposes of God.

The practical outworking of this is that friendship of Jesus means that friendship with others is our goal. Not just the casual, entertainment or shared interest types of friendships (not that they are bad things in of themselves), but deep friendships. Here, Jesus weaves friendship (philous), i.e. those with whom we share brotherly love (philia) and agape, that love God shows and we are to share.

We are to have agape for each other just as Jesus had agape for them, in his time with them and in dying for them on the cross - and hence by extention to those whom Jesus has also died for (theology warning: issues about election here!). 

And how do people identify those who belong to Jesus (as opposed to how one becomes one who belongs to Jesus); you love each other as friends. Agape is expressed in the context of philia (so probably making too big a distinction between these words isn't helpful).

At the very least, Christians should have some deep friendships with other Christians. Love is shown to all to be sure, but just as the 12 had each other, it is helpful to have close Christian friendships, not just as a means to greater holiness of character, but as an end in itself, a reflection of Christ's love, and indeed the inner life of the trinity.

God is friendship

I've recently been reading a book by a friend, Dr Brian Edgar entitled God is Friendship. I want to start a series of reflections on this idea.

In John 15, Jesus says:

¹² “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. ¹³ No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. ¹⁴ You are my friends if you do what I command you. ¹⁵ I do not call you servants any longer, because the servant does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. ¹⁶ You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. ¹⁷ I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another. (NRSV)

Jesus does not call his disciples servants (or slaves, doulous) any longer, instead he makes everything that God is telling Jesus known to them. There are no secrets - even if they didn't understand all of it at the time. Remember, as a farewell discourse, he is preparing them for life without him face to face.

The idea of being friends with Jesus can be hard to swallow. For some, it is "Jesus my girlfriend" as captured by too many over sentimental choruses, yet the disciples were Jesus friends because of his revelation, and the believer by extension as well (since we have the same revelation only written down).

Some argue that friendship is too egalitarian and that it brings Jesus too far down to our level. I'd have thought that was the whole point of the incarnation. But that aside, Jesus chose the disciples and not vice versa (all arguments about predestination aside, it is a historical fact here of his choosing them).

So at the very least, let's understand our standing of Jesus not merely as one of obligation or obedience (though the latter is true, the former probably not the best way of putting it) but of brotherly love (philia). This is, as Edgar says, a powerful corrective to the tendency of some of us to fall into a sense of duty, when there is so much more to express and experience as friends of Jesus.

The revolutionary Lord's prayer

Christianity is often seen as or hoped to be about prayers and ceremony. So when we see that Christians being arrested is the new black, what do we make of it?

One of my friends was arrested for praying in Scott Morrison's office, praying for him to change his mind on his heartless and ungodly policy of locking up children in gulag like conditions with scant regard for their dignity, let alone international law, and prayer for those children.

Another friend of mine was arrested at Maules Creek, opposing a mine that has little popular support among locals, farmers, indigenous Australians, doctors, nurses and religious leaders. It is destructive of the local environment, and via climate change of the entire globe.

I want to suggest that these and many other actions, not just private prayers and confessions but public acts of protest against issues of ethical, political and economic concern are all mandated (after careful thought about the issues themselves) by the Lord's Prayer.

I want to go through it slowly in a series of posts - but we need to think before praying this for ourselves that it is in part answered already.

The Father of the only son has shared this prayer to those who believed in his name and were made children of God (John 1:12). The kingdom has come as Jesus was crucified: dressed as a king and mocked by Roman soldiers, interrogated as king by Pilate and crucified with the title of 'king of the Jews' above him. In Romans 1 Paul makes it clear that what was said in mockery was ironically true, proved by the resurrection.

Jesus is our daily bread, the bread of life (not ignoring the fact that we need physical sustenance). Ironically too - his did the Father's will so that he was not immediately delivered from evil but handed over to be crucified so that evil may be defeated.

And yet the evil we see and the times of trial we face tell us this prayer is still to be prayed. And that will be the subject of another post.

Things, can only get better ... Genesis 5

For some reason, when reading this passage I had the song "Things can only get better" in my head. Genesis 5 is an odd passage. I once knew someone I was working with comment on the ages in Genesis 5 as "missing the decimal point". I find the ages hard to square with what we know about human history, and it is not unusual for other Ancient Near Eastern texts to speak of such long lives. But all arguments aside (this is a devotional blog), what are we supposed to learn from this?

Firstly, the author re-iterates in verses 1-2 that humans are not merely an evolutionary accident, but created in the image of God - all human beings. In a manner typical of the era, the names of the fathers are mentioned. Seth is the image and likeness of his father just as Adam (and Eve) are the image and likeness of God. The message is, it still passes down, even if marred by Adam and Eve's actions. All people bear this stamp, and it runs down Adam's line.

It is also obvious that the greater the distance from the garden in time, the more the loss of access to the tree of life is manifest. Regardless of what you think about the factual nature of the ages, it shows the growth of corruption and decay that is discussed elsewhere in this passage, be it Lamech's attitude to violence, Babel or the comments made before the flood. Things don't look like they are getting better.

Today we seem to do violence more efficiently, it is still pervasive in society (Hollywood bears some of the blame) and we've seen enough shocking events - from the Holocaust to firebombing Dresden and Tokyo, Agent Orange, death camps, gulags and drones (to name but a few) to show that progress isn't always (often) moral. This might overlook many positive benefits which I don't want to downplay, but we need to recognise genuine evil when we see it.

So where is the progress in this passage? Like all of the biblical genealogies, it's at the end with Noah. He would bring rest from toiling with the cursed ground (for those in an agricultural society, this would have spoken very loud, for us in cities it is much more muted - but wait for climate change to ramp up further). Noah's story follows soon.

But this makes me think about other genealogies, like that in Luke 3 that follows Jesus back to Adam. Jesus is the image of the invisible God (Colossians) who fulfills all that image is meant to be. In doing so, in him, things can only get better.

Atonement is political - non-violence and leadership

A famous text in Mark's gospel which is taken as a proof text in atonement theology is 10:45

For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.

Usually, this is wedded to penal substitutionary atonement, and so Jesus' death is seen to be a payment to ransom us from punishment. This view needs a bit of nuancing. Context will help as well will see shortly.

The word ransom is lutron, and is used in the context of slavery and ransoming or freeing a slave from the market. The most obvious source of the slavery here is to sin, but I wonder in a sense (and context might make a case) that the devil is also part of it - given the theme early of binding the strongman and robbing his house. There are echoes of this in John's gospel when Jesus says that the ruler of this world is going to be thrown down when he ascends to the cross.

We need to be careful with demonology, but the idea behind human evil, particularly that of evil structures and systems finds a good deal of resonance in the gospels. There are plenty of models of the atonement; we don't need to flatten them into one.

In the Exodus, chapter 8 and verse 23 we read:

I will put a division between My people and your people. Tomorrow this sign will occur.

However, the Hebrew has "set a ransom" instead of "put a division". The Israelites were rescued from Egypt, it's slavery, empire and gods.

Now it makes more sense of Jesus' critique of the disciple's question of who is the greatest, and his critique of the way in which Gentiles (read Rome) rule over people.

Jesus ransoms us from every evil empire, evil structure, with sin and the devil at its heart so that we can live a new life of freedom. That new life includes a new way of being in society at all levels, a new approach to leadership. Atonement is communal and political.

Fighting violence with violence means violence wins - Genesis 4

I don't suppose I am a complete pacifist; if you drew a spectrum I'm not sure where I'd sit. I do however understand that violence is a failure of peacemaking, war a failure of diplomacy. Sometimes that's because someone was not interested in peace, and sometimes that means that second best must be turned to.

But in the lives of most of us, for most of the time, violence of behaviour or rhetoric means that violence grows, violence wins. In argument, in relationships, there can be another way. And in public policy, we can lobby for better ways.

The story of Cain and Abel has a strange end - the warning that Cain would be avenged seven times if he were killed (Genesis 4:15). It is still a limit on revenge, and it is declared by God. It does stress the sanctity of life. And it is from an age of violence.

So when Lamech himself proclaims a much larger vengeance, and an unbalanced one, for it was death for a wounding and not death for death, we see how retribution can go so wrong (verses 23-24). Vengeance, not justice is in view. The image of God in chapter 1 seems not to extend to Lamech's victim. In many Ancient Near Eastern contexts, the image of God was limited to the nobility or king. In Hebrew thought, murder was denied because all are in the image of God.

Comparing Rwanda to South Africa, we see how the pursuit of truth and reconciliation trumps revenge. While due process and punishment are often appropriate, simply locking someone up or taking their life is not enough, when reconciliation and restorative justice can bring more closure, greater peace, and an end to the desire for revenge. This isn't being soft on law and order, but simply seeking a better order.

As long as there is sin there will be prisons, but for the every day of our relationships, we lock ourselves in prisons of anger and unforgiveness if we want to pursue vengeance for ourselves. God promises to repay. There are authorities to trust in. Sometimes we just let go, other times we actively seek reconciliation. But if our words and actions turn violent, it can only spiral in one direction. And Jesus died, not so individuals can wield weapons and words of anger, but so we can be agents of peace.

Keeping our brothers and sisters - Genesis 4

I've been thinking a bit about origins of late, and the whole issue of human goodness and tendency to evil. Students in a course on science and religion I tutor on answered a question about evolution and "Original Sin". The more informed students understood that this phrase is often associated with Augustine. An Irenaean approach is more compatible with evolution, where there is no perfect past, just a humanity that is created in order to grow up and aspire to fully carry out the role of bearing the image of God.

I've also started reading Reason for Hope by Jane Goodall after hearing her speak recently. She's a Christian, though these days it seems of a more universalist persuasion if I've understood her right. She obviously has some insight into human behaviour and its origins by studying chimps.

In the end, regardless of how you view our material origins, Genesis 4 shows us what history has illustrated again and again, we are capable of great violence.

Cain kills Abel out of jealousy when God sees into the heart and prefers Abel's gift. When asked where he was, Cain asks "am I my brother's keeper?" This disavowal of his role to care for another human seems to me a rejection of his brother as also bearing the image of God. It has always been the case that violence against other humans is preceded by dehumanising them. The Holocaust is a shocking example of this, but I suspect much of what is felt towards asylum seekers who come by boat in popular thought, the unemployed in conservative thought, Indigenous Australians by those who'd deny them recognition in the constitution are all symptomatic of the inability to empathise because they have been dehumanised.

In a world where the lines on maps are often drawn by us, but where trade, greenhouse gases and pollution all flow over these lines, everyone is our neighbour. Given our shared genetic origins, everyone is a brother or sister. For Christians, there is a special sense of this "in Christ", this does nothing to diminish our need to regard everyone this way, for we are all in the "image of God". This means rather than being an object of violence, other people should be the subjects of our keeping: keeping safe, keeping well, keeping in filial relationship.

Blessed are the peacemakers.