Viral Faith

  "Reconciliation without a clear understanding of the needed reciprocity destines those in the pursuit of reconciliation to do so on preexisting constructs of power, ultimately rendering this endeavor toward reconciliation to be nothing more than a nuanced and complicated captivity for people of color"     --Rev. Brandon Green in Intercultural Ministry (Grace Ji-Sun Kim, editor) The early church (first generation after Jesus' death) was a multicultural, multi-ethnic, socially diverse movement.  The lives and social worldview of the initial followers of Jesus throughout the Roman empire were just as polarized then as our communities are today.  Yet, the difference is that they rejected homophily (anthropologic description of the desire to gather with people who are like yourself) and formed intimate communities made up of people who were radically different but radically in love with Jesus.  In these early communities, we see no diminishment in individual i...

"This was the primary message of the Biblical prophets; religiosity is not an acceptable alternative to doing the works of righteousness and justice." -- Dr. Marvin McMickle in "Let the Oppressed Go Free". Righteousness and Justice are among the most important Biblical words in the Hebrew Scriptures (what Christian's term the Old Testament).  Mishpat , the Hebrew word for "justice" appears in the Hebrew Scriptures over 400 times and Tzedekah , the word for "righteousness" occurs over 300 times.  The words are often used together as they are closely related terms. Tzedekah , or righteousness is far more expansive than how it is typically used in contemporary churches.  We often speak of righteousness in terms of our "rightness to a standard or set of rules".  Yet, the Hebrew word is a relational term.  In fact, there is no Hebrew word in the Scriptures for "individual".  The promotion of individuality is a relatively modern...

"Jesus' message about the kingdom of God lived out in this life has powerful implications for how we prioritize, peace, reconciliation, and enemy love in relationship with God and with others.  Ignore this aspect of gospel, and we are left with a religion that proclaims love and forgiveness while it advances through violent attitudes and actions." -- Bruxy Cavey in Reunion The book of Ruth begins with this innocent phrase "During the days when the judges ruled".  While it gives us chronological context (roughly 1400 to 1000 BCE) its purpose in the narrative is to give us cultural and political context.  The book of Judges documents the often violent, warring, and scavenging existence that coexisted with the spiritual bankruptcy of the people at the time.  The story of Ruth begins in famine in a time where the people of ancient Palestine were often vying for scarce resources.  This scarcity, led to violence.  In fact, one can look at contemporary society and...

  The Church and Societal Forces of Injustice   “Slavery was upheld by three sectors of society: religious, economic, and political.” —Tom Skinner in How black is the Gospel (1971)   One of the ongoing discussions among church leaders is the role of the church in regards to the formation, influence, and regulation of the societies in which they serve.  Many believe that churches are to promote the highest ethical standards and leverage its many privileges to encourage its surrounding society to embrace those same standards.  Others believe the church is a vendor of religious products that seeks to enhance the lives of its adherents, without any responsibility to those outside of its body.  I believe that the answer is clearly spelled out in Scripture, embodied by Jesus Christ, and promoted by the early Church.   Historically, it is important to understand the duplicitous role of the church in both bringing about justice and promoting inj...

  But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things! (Galatians 5:22-23 NLT) The Greek Scriptures that we commonly call the "New Testament" reveal God's story to restore Shalom through the work of Jesus, extended though the church.  While there are lots of moving parts of the narrative, and lots of literary devices employed in which to convey the primacy of THE STORY, it comes down to evil being discarded through love made visible.  Relationships healed, community restored, and the powers that separate, distort and destroy are banished. "Shalom is an ancient Israeli construct concretizing practical loved to be expressed through structures and systems" --Randy S. Woodley in Decolonizing Evangelicalism Shalom is a state of healthy community where relationships and processes are redeemed in love.  This is the essence of the Go...

Jesus is repetitive, and his Judean hearers do not get the message because of the power of the dominant myth to exclude other possible truths.  -- Wes Howard-Brook in Becoming Children of God Today, I read an article where an author was making an attempt to define conservative and progressive Christians.  In his eagerness to define the two groups, he used theological terms to try and describe political realities. The purpose of the article was to analyze how different Christian identities impact political and faith practices.  I would disagree with the author in understanding that both self-identified conservative and self-progressive Christians can agree on the Inerrancy of Scripture and the centrality and exclusivity of Jesus in salvation (those are the two criteria he used).  I share this only to emphasize the politicization of Christian identity formation.  In fact, there is often such a fierce affinity towards political realities, that it is often fused in...

  "So Jews othered non-Jews, Greeks othered non-Greeks, and Romans othered non-Romans.  Each divided the world into us and them, where them is always wild, violent, unmanly, dirty, stupid, lazy, horny and yet scary.  That was, of course, because they were not actually wild, violent, unmanly, and so forth, but they were actually scary... All this ethnic othering had to do finally with trying to put a finger on that fear factor.  Why are we so afraid?"  -- Stephen Patterson in The Forgotten Creed Throughout history, cultures develop narratives to understand their identity and root that identity in community values, informed by the experiences of a people.  The narrative or myth may be based entirely on a true rendering of historical facts or can be a carefully crafted multigenerational account of fictionalized stories that support a culture/nation/people's preferred understanding of themselves.  It should not be surprising to most to acknowledge that is ...