Love of Torah or Torah of Love?

We're all familiar with with the parable of the Good Samaritan, right? A religious man after asking how he could inherit eternal life hears Jesus respond with, "Love God and Love your neighbor". And in response the man asks, "Who is my neighbor?". What he was really asking is, "Who is pure?" which was really a question of, "Who is worthy of Love?". And so responding to this deeper issue Jesus tells the story of the Good Samaritan. What we miss is that in this story the Priest and Levite who pass by the beaten man weren't cold hearted toward the man as we usually think. They were passionate about follow the Torah which said NOT to touch dead people or they would breach their purity. The only corpes they could touch were close family all others would cuase impurity even if they got so close that their shadow touched it. So, they crossed to the other side of the road to follow their love for the Torah. What Jesus reveals is that out of their love for the Torah they have missed the point! This was a Torah OF love!

So here's the question: If we are to love God and love others, Jesus is asking his audience, what happens when love-of-God-as-obeying-Torah comes into conflict with love-of-God-as-following-Jesus That's a tough one, for all of us. But for Jesus the answer is clear: Loving God properly always means that we will tend to the needs of others.

Easter More than Eggs?

I feel I could write passionately from a couple angles this Easter morning. For instance the way the god of materialism has captured the minds of so many on wonderful days of remembrance such as today BUT even more passionately I am full of hope this morning.

Just looking on the nightly news, listening to the gossip at work, hearing of wars and genocide around the world, heck even paying attention to our own thoughts we can see clearly the effects of, the first man, Adam's choice to eat of the fruit in the garden. And it's not only effected humans but the way humans have cared for the rest of the world. I would bet we might struggle to recognize the world if it were not affected by our thousands of year of maltreatment. But consider this mind blowing statement by the Apostle Paul in Romans 5,
"For if, by the sin of the one man, death reigned through that one man, HOW MUCH MORE will those who received God's abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ."

HOW MUCH MORE?! What?! You see I believe the life, death and resurrection (Easter) of Jesus can exponentially effect our lives and our world for good compared to the evil that has entered through the effects of Adam. And its not just the cross that makes it so. For if it were just the cross we would be forgiven and that's it, Jesus would still be in the grave. But we needed power to conquer sin, to rise above it and so Jesus provides us with that as well by rising from the dead which is what I and Christians all around the world celebrate this morning.

The Politics of Jesus

You've got to pick up this book ASAP. It's as if my mind has been unlocked from a layer Imagination Shrink Wrap. Another world is possible because we don't have to live by the "rules" we have always thought told us what was actually feasible. We don't have to (or get the leisure to) leave the governing of the earth to the government but we partner with God in caring for the needs of the world as a set apart people under and among the rest of the world. No, there are no thoughts of an uprising that violently overthrows our government but in the Way of Jesus there is hope for change in acts of subversive enemy love and revolutionary subordination or how about Christian Imagination. Consider:

"Insanity is trying to get different results by doing the same things"- don't know

Are we trying to get "our man" in the white house in the hopes that things will really change? Has that ever really made much of a difference? Really?

"One thing that's clear in scripture is that the nations do not lead people to peace; rather, people lead the nations to peace." pg 306

HOLD ON TO YOUR SEATS:
Today's logic goes something like this: "Calling a ruler 'Son of God'(which is what the people called Ceasar)is out of style. No one really does that nowadays. We can support a president while also worshiping Jesus as the Son of God." But how is this possible? For one says that we must love our enemies, and the other says we must kill them; one promotes the economics of competition, while the other admonishes the forgiveness of debts. to which do we pledge allegiance? Surely, one of them must have the wrong idea of how to move history. Can a servant serve two masters?-pg 167

I could share so much more from the book but you'd do best to read it yourself and in the mean time go to www.jesusforpresident.org and click on the "book" link and read the appendix sections.

Brown Co. Cabin Vacation

Interesting

"As soon as the Gospels were written, speech without experience began to dabble with the new facts proposed by the existence of the Church...People tried to think the new life without being touched by it first in some form of call, listening, passion or change of heart."
- Eugen Rosenstock-Huessy

Let's not be like that or settle for so little.

The Way is a rocky path

When one enlists in follow The Way, Jesus, one does not walk the side walks of Easy Street. One finds himself on the Rigorous Road of Suffering. But it's on this road that He finds out who he is and what he's made of. Who He is and Who made him. He finds out what is really worth suffering for and that he is in the midst of that great purpose. Following The Way strips away the comforts that keep one from the Comforter. It's a rocky path with amazing views of the horizon which is to come and it is this view that keeps one following The Way. Things are not as they should be or will be but knowing The Way is a road that leads to the way things were always meant to be is a road worth walking.

"The Lord gives and the Lord takes away, Blessed be the name of the Lord" -Job

The Jesus Creed

Orthodox Jews have a practice of reciting the Shema, which is Hebrew for "Hear", the first word of the text recited, twice a day. The text comes from Dueteronomy 6:4-9 and reads,

"Hear O Isreal, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.
Love the Lord your God with all your heart,
with all your soul,
with all your mind and with all your strength.
These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts.
Impress them on your children. Talk about them (all the time, basically)...

What it's essentially is saying and what the Jews understand is this commandment, LOVE GOD BY FOLLOWING THE TORAH.

Then Jesus comes on the scene when this practice of reciting the Shema is in full force and is asked what the greatest commandment is. The questioner was surely fully prepared to hear Jesus recite the Shema but what he heard was this,

"Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One.
Love the Lord your God with all you heart,
with all your soul
with all your mind and all your strength.
And the second is this, "Love your neighbor as yourself"
There is no greater commandment than these."

Jesus amends the Shema of Judaism by adding Love for others not just God. Ultimately what Jesus is saying is we were made to LOVE GOD BY FOLLOWING JESUS AND LOVE OTHERS.


These ideas come from a book called "the jesus creed" by Scot Mcknight