On the Road to Emmaus » Pneumatology (Spirit)

What is Spirituality? Part 2 – Heaven and Earth Converge

Richard — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 23:15:59 +0000

Spirituality means “Life in God’s Spirit” rather than a vague and ethereal sense of “religiousness” or “inner attunement.” From briefly looking at the role of the Holy Spirit in the Bible (see part 1 – Christian Spirituality is Not Spiritual), we see that the Holy Spirit, rather than being in contrast to the physical and material world, plays a vital role in the creation, preservation and restoration of the visible, public, physical, material, bodily, social, and experiential existence of life on planet earth. If Christian spirituality is “Life in God’s Spirit,” then it is not spiritual in the sense that it pulls us away from engaging with the concrete realities of life into a focus on the immaterial and invisible. Christian spirituality rather draws us deeper into a passionate engagement with life, celebrating its joys, mourning its sorrows and pouring ourselves out in love to see its God-gifted purpose restored and flourishing into full flower.

Perhaps a seemingly strange verse to continue our discussion is Ephesians 1:10. Here Paul, at a climactic moment in his broad and sweeping oration of God’s purposes, declares that in Christ, God has publicly displayed “a plan for the fullness of time, to gather up all things under one head in him, the things in heaven and the things on earth.” The entire drama of blessing, calling, adoption, redemption, forgiveness, grace and mystery are summarized as a unification, a reconciliation, even a restoration of the entire cosmos in Christ. The scope of which Paul speaks should not be missed. He mentions not merely individuals being reconciled to God, but rather how a fracturing in the entire created order is being mended and set right in and through Christ. Indeed, for the creation has groaned since its bondage to decay began (cf. Rom. 8:19ff), when its pristine state had been infested by thorns and thistles, its ground soaked with the blood of human violence and its fate imprisoned under the futility of inevitable death. The entire creation’s alienation from God, which had allowed such havoc to run free and spread throughout all its members, is being undone in and through Christ. Heaven and Earth are being united as one. Rather than us escaping the woes of earth to the bliss of heaven, the glory and radiance of the divine life and will as perfectly expressed in heaven will come to earth in a transformation of untold proportions. Heaven and Earth will converge and the fulness of God’s desire and intention for life on planet earth will come to a wondrous fruition. This plan has been set on public display in Christ and has begun its implementation, yet awaits its final fulfillment at the consummation of the age.

Paul continues in verse thirteen and fourteen to call the Holy Spirit, “the downpayment of our inheritance.” The Holy Spirit is thus a “partial payment,” so to speak, in advance of the full inheritance. One day God will fully and finally complete the restoration of the entire cosmos he began in Christ. In the meantime however, the Holy Spirit is the “down-payment” of such, the living personal presence of the restoration of all things. As people in-dwelt by the Holy Spirit, we embody the convergence of Heaven and Earth and the restoration of all things which will be fully consummated when our Lord returns. Here we arrive at a central feature of Christian spirituality. Christian spirituality, that is, “life in God’s Spirit,” means that we (individually, but more so as a community of the faithful) become the place where even now, in advance of its consummation, Heaven and Earth intersect. The renewal of earth’s life is now manifested in the community of God’s people. We are the instrument through which creation’s plight is even now beginning to be undone. So when we speak of “spirituality,” and specifically so, “cultivating one’s spirituality,” this means not so much a private subjective exercise, but rather, engaging in the process by which we expunge the hatred, violence and apathy perpetuating our common plight and become a community in and through which the intersection of Heaven and Earth becomes increasingly expressed, through which the spring time of New Creation bursts into flower. The practices of “spirituality” are those through which even now God is making “all things new” and creating us as a people through whom He renews the face of the earth.

What is Spirituality? Part 1 – Christian Spirituality is Not Spiritual

Richard — Mon, 31 May 2010 01:36:22 +0000

What is “spirituality?” Or, what does it mean to be “spiritual”? Spirituality is often understood as that which relates to the immaterial spirit or soul in contrast to that which is physical or material. In another sense, spirituality is that which relates to a certain form of religion or religious belief. Then “spirituality” means a vague or ethereal sense of “religiosity,” “mysticism” or “devotionalism,” which is restricted to a private sphere of internal experience and practice.

The Christian notion of “spirituality” is different. Biblical spirituality always means “Life in God’s Spirit.” At this point I would like to give a few brief vignettes of the Holy Spirit and see how they compare to the definitions of “spirituality” given above.

1) The Holy Spirit is the operative power in the creation of Heaven and Earth - Genesis 1:1-2 – In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters.

2) The Holy Spirit is the life-force which keeps all living things alive – Psalm 104:29-30 - You hide Your face, they [all living things] are dismayed; You take away their spirit, they expire and return to their dust. 30 You send forth Your Spirit, they are created; And You renew the face of the earth.

3) The Holy Spirit raised the body of Jesus from the dead – 1 Peter 3:18 – “For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the Spirit.”

4) The Holy Spirit will raise all from the dead at the end of the age – Romans 8:11 – If the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, He who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.

5) The Holy Spirit will be the regenerative energy of the entire creation’s revitalization – Isaiah 32:14-15 – ““For the palace is forsaken, the populous city deserted; the hill and the watchtower will become dens forever, a joy of wild donkeys, a pasture of flocks; 15 until the Spirit is poured upon us from on high, and the wilderness becomes a fruitful field, and the fruitful field is deemed a forest.”

If we consider these 5 snapshots of the Holy Spirit in Scripture, we see that the Holy Spirit is vitally connected to the “physical” and “material” world – its creation, preservation and restoration. Therefore any biblical sense of “spirituality” as “life in God’s Spirit” cannot center in the contradistinction between what is “physical” and “spiritual,” “material” and “immaterial,” “visible” and “invisible.” Christian spirituality is patently not “spiritual” in this sense. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of Life, the Spirit of Creation, the creative energy that interpenetrates the entire universe with the gracious and life-giving personal presence of God. This is very exciting because as we shall see, Christian spirituality is not a detached and isolated private practice, nor the abandonment of the life we love and long for, but centers around the God of grace and infinite delight brining about the transformation and restoration of the physical, material, bodily, visible, and public world.

New Years Resolutions, Industrial Holiness and the Spirituality of Life

Richard — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 23:50:59 +0000

I am personally not a fan of new-years resolutions, because most never get accomplished. However, I’ve decided to take some time to reflect on what it might mean to “sanctify” the coming year to God. My thoughts here are following Jurgen Moltmann’s book Spirit of Life.

Moltmann takes issue with popularized conceptions of “spirituality.” Sometimes spirituality means nothing more than “religiousness” or “devotionalism.” Such equations can cut off spirituality from everyday life. It can also establish a schism between the “religious,” that is, the clergy and the cloistered, and the laity, the common person. One group is “spiritual” and the other, the overwhelming majority, is unable to access such a place. It can also drive a wedge between the “spiritual” and the sensory, assigning greater value to the “spiritual” and a diminished or even negative value to the sensory and bodily experiences of life. Furthermore, life can be neatly separated into its superior “vertical” (Godward or heavenly) and ancillary “horizontal” (relational, human or earthly) dimensions. This dichotomization disintegrates what God made a coherent whole, and in effect “splits life in two, quenching its vitality.” (Jurgen Moltmann, Spirit of Life: a Universal Affirmation, p. 84)

However, it is of fundamental concern that the concept of “spirituality” be vitally connected to the Biblical understanding of the Holy Spirit. Spirituality is, after all, “life in God’s Spirit.” In the Old Testament, the ruach (Spirit) is the power that created all things and interpenetrates the life of all the living (Ps. 104.29ff., Gen. 1). In the New Testament, the Spirit is the power that raises Jesus bodily from the dead, inaugurating the “final springtime of creation (Rom 1.4; 8.11; 1 Tim 3.16),” the definitive restoration of life on earth (Moltmann, p. 84). This gives us an understanding of the Spirit that is immanently connected, rather than opposed, to physical, material, bodily, sensory and relational life.

Overcoming dualistic tendencies with regards to the Spirit and spirituality, Moltmann wants to understand “spirituality” as vitality, as a love for life. This expresses itself in an affirmed social and bodily existence. “In the experience of the Spirit, the spring of life begins to flow in us again. We begin to flower and become fruitful. An undreamt-of love for life awakens in us, driving out the infection of resignation, and healing painful remembrances. We go to meet life expecting the rebirth of everything that lives, and with this expectation, we experience our own rebirth, and the rebirth we share with everything else.” (p. 95)

We can then reach out to the world with the eagerness, innocence and expectation of a child (Matt. 18.1-5). A jaded attitude towards ourselves and the world melts with the rising of a vibrant love for life. The release of the body from the fears of “age-aquired wisdom,” which cynically expects the triumph of death, frees the arms to extend and embrace. The love of life empowered by the hope of resurrection looses the shackles of the soul with a penchant for retreating into the refuge of isolation. Open to the world, faith, hope and love once again flow in the risky endeavor of whole-hearted living (p. 97).

Life in the Spirit is not life against the body, it is life against death. It is everything that stands against the maniacal death drives of modern culture. It is awakening from the slumber of apathy and mechanistic living. “In this world, with its modern ‘sickness unto death,’ true spirituality will be the restoration of the love for life – that is to say, vitality. The full and unreserved ‘yes’ to life, and the full and unreserved love for the living are the first experiences of God’s Spirit, which is not for nothing called fons vitae, ‘the well of life’” (p. 97).

Moltmann wants to recast the concept of sanctification in light of the theology of the Spirit he has already been developing. He begins by discussing John Wesley’s “methodisitic” holiness. John Wesley’s “societies” arose at the time of the burgeoning industrial revolution. “The Christian discipline to which they submitted themselves and their bodies corresponded precisely to the discipline of their work in the factories” (p. 166). Wesley’s methods had a healing effect on isolated people who had been forced to leave home to search for work in the factories. It gave them community, stability and self-confidence in a time when there was much uncertainty and instability. However, because we are leaving the industrial age and moving into the post-industrial age, we need a renewed vision of the Christian life that is “related to the sickness of the given society in a healing way” (p. 171). The discipline of the industrial revolution has produced a society where production and efficiency have become the highest virtues. When such happens, the human body is reduced to a machine and the mind to a computer. No time remains for full-blooded feeling. The integrity of human being is sorely violated. The simultaneous growth of production and consumption that have flourished under the myth of progress have shown their debilitating effects on the psychological, relational and ecological condition of life on earth. As our production and consumption increases, we find ourselves unable to engage in living-giving relationships that God created the human race to enjoy mirroring His triune fellowship of love: Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

A renewed concept of sanctification begins, for Moltmann, with the concept of spirituality as vitality and is embodied in the rediscovery of the sanctity of all life. Recognizing the holiness of all life effectuates the ethic Albert Schweitzer termed ‘reverence for life’: “Anyone who loves ‘the living God’ loves the life of all living things” (p. 172). This has communal (loving brothers and sisters), social (loving the poor and weak), and ecological (loving creation) dimensions. Reverence for life also “requires the renunciation of violence towards life,” including violence towards creation and violence towards one’s own life. The “violent regimentation” of one’s own life and body produces physical and psychological infertility, an inability to grow. The life oriented toward self-mastery, which by nature blocks off “whole sectors of life” must be loosed to allow for the “spontaneity of faith” (p. 173). This requires a greater trust in God than the discipline that breeds deeper mistrust. While this may seem contrary to Wesley’s methods, it is not contrary to Wesley’s intention “to heal soul and body” (p. 173). Wesley understood sin as a sickness that required healing (p. 164). The faithlessness, fear, anger and violence that lie hidden beneath ruthless discipline and regimentation must today be recognized as part of the sickness of sin the soul needs to be healed from. In such, specific actions are not sanctified, but entire lives are sanctified in the presence of the God of life. The word “holy” is again recognized in terms of its semantic origin: to be holy is to be made whole, to have integrity of being and life restored to a fragmented and divided existence, for the brutal violence of self-domination and other-manipulation to be relinquished in the trusting spontaneity of faith and sanctifying affirmation of life (pp. 175-6).

With this said, it might seem an attempt to cast off restraint and discipline, that any related “New Year’s Resolutions” would be about loosing the shackles of a regimented, scheduled existence. Such would be a superficial reading. I still plan on having and keeping a schedule. I have a passion to be a faithful steward of everything God has given me, especially time. However, it is true and essential to maintain there is nothing inherently Christian about discipline and it can be remarkably unchristian when it functions to destroy the goodness of what God loves. My New Years resolutions mostly relate to resisting the freneticism that schedules out the breathing space which enables the heart to live and delight in love. I am also keen to resist the constant encroaching of technology which seeks to mechanize life and dull the affections. God calls us to live a quiet and peaceful life, for in this stillness alone can the heart truly be present to God and there discover the “broad and open space” of love for live within which it can flourish and thrive.

My 2010 New Years Resolutions:

1) to never for any reason tell someone else that I am busy and thus imply that my “busy-ness” is more important than them or is an excuse to treat them poorly (thanks to my undergrad spirituality professor Mike Walters for this gem).

2) to leave my phone on silent and not check or send text messages while in the prayer room or when having a conversation with someone. Both when in prayer and in conversation I want to be fully present to the persons involved and not constantly detaching by frenetic digital communication.

3) to check my e-mail no more than twice a day. This is related to the previous one as far as frenetic digital communication goes. I am not so important that I need to be constantly accessible. I will also not upgrade my cell phone to be able to get email or internet. I’ll sacrifice having “the world at my finger tips” in order to maintain my sanity and quietness of being.

4) to regularly give people my undivided attention when talking with them, to interrupt less, speak less and listen more.

5) to periodically (though not frequently) allow significant relationships to disrupt my schedule.

6) to regularly remind myself that the people “under” me as a leader are not cogs in a wheel but people with precious and vulnerable hearts, abounding with love, hope, hurt, fear and God-inspired dreams.

7) to breathe deeply and be more fully present to God.

When the Day of Pentecost had Fully Come… (Part 1)

Richard — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 10:48:56 +0000

The coming of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost, as described in Acts chapter 2, was an epochal and unrepeatable event in salvation history. This was not simply the first time the disciples received the Holy Spirit (remember, Jesus breathes on them in John 20 shortly after his resurrection). Neither was Pentecost simply the first is a series of similar events. Rather, as this series will attempt to show, Pentecost, taken together with the death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus, marks the inauguration of God’s future for the world breaking into the present (see my previous post “New Creation…Starting Now”). Pentecost was a turning point in the Creator God’s plan to deal with the problem of sin by overturning its effects and redeeming the entire creation. Pentecost was the beginning of the church operating in the authority of Jesus and manifesting God’s Kingdom and salvation on earth as it is in heaven, as a token, sign and pledge of the day when God’s reign will fully come in the restoration of the entire cosmos. This has broad and far-reaching implications for the present life and mission of the People of God.

I imagine this sounds slightly different than the oft-heard sequence: Jesus died for our salvation, the resurrection confirmed the efficacy of the cross and the coming of the Holy Spirit empowers us to announce Jesus’ death. I would like to challenge this sequence in favor of an alternate one: the Father sends Jesus to became Incarnate for our salvation; Jesus lived among us for our salvation; Jesus, being baptized, was given the Spirit by the Father for our salvation; Jesus died for our salvation; Jesus was raised from the dead by the Father for our salvation; Jesus ascended into heaven for our salvation; and the Holy Spirit came for our salvation. This approach prefers to see the entire sequence accomplishing our salvation as a vital and coherent unity. This may tweak our understanding of “salvation” and at the same time gives salvation an overall Trinitarian shape. It also reminds me of Thomas Cranmer’s Great Litany of 1544 (which incidentally, was the first piece of liturgy ever written in the English language), which for our salvation and deliverance implores the benefits of the entire soteriological (salvation) sequence:

…by the mystery of they holy Incarnation; by thy holy Nativity and submission to the Law; by thy Baptism, Fasting and Temptation…By thine Agony and Bloody Sweat; by thy Cross and Passion; by thy precious Death and Burial; by thy glorious Resurrection and Ascension; and by the Coming of the Holy Ghost: Good Lord, deliver us.

Today is the day in which Pentecost is liturgically commemorated in the Western Churches (those that are not Eastern Orthodox). This ends the fifty day celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus and begins what is commonly referred to as “Ordinary Time,” which lasts until Advent in December. To be “ordinary” means there is no overarching liturgical commemoration marking this season in the way there is for example, during Advent and Lent. I like to think of “Ordinary Time” as the “Season of Pentecost.” That would make the largest season in the church year (varies year to year, but as much as 29 weeks) focused on the messy task of the Church empowered by God’s Spirit setting out to implement in worship, word, deed, life and love, what had been accomplished in the events commemorated from Advent through Pentecost.

So in honor of this season, I would like to take a number of posts over the next few weeks to explore, to the best of my ability, the meaning of Pentecost and the Coming of the Holy Spirit. In order to do this, I will one-at-a-time explore Old Testament passages which are alluded to in the second chapter of Acts. As is true of much of the New Testament, Acts 2 has many allusions to the Old Testament. This is not simply as a bit of cultural coloring, but precisely because the author wants us to understand these events as in dynamic continuity with the ongoing and unfinished drama the Old Testament is telling. This is especially the case because the authors (indeed, the early church) believed that these events functioned as a critical and climactic turning point in the narrative. What had been promised and prophesied in earlier days was coming to pass in their own days (this is exactly what Peter says in his sermon later in the same chapter).

In this narrative tour, our first stop will be the Tower of Babel…

God’s Grandeur

Richard — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 19:36:18 +0000

In my last post, I quoted a line from a poem by Gerard Manley Hopkins, an English poet who lived between the years of 1844 and 1889. The poem is so magnificent, I felt compelled to reproduce “God’s Grandeur” in its entirety. If some of the lines seem a little dense, try this commentary for assistance.

THE WORLD is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs—
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

A Prayer for Revival

Richard — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 02:39:19 +0000

Gracious Lord, whose generous hand is open to every living thing: send forth your Spirit according to your promise, that, in the overflow of your liberality, all creatures would find new life, and the earth itself experience rebirth, through the resurrection of Jesus the Messiah our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.

Spirit and Flesh Part 2

Richard — Sun, 15 Jun 2008 08:36:35 +0000

In the last post I developed the idea of flesh/spirit, particularly from the angle of eschatology. To understanding the Spirit biblically, it must be considered in light of eschatology because the Spirit is the life and power of the age to come. The Spirit is not simply a force or power, but a person who is drawing the entire created order towards God’s future, renewing life and overcoming the powers of death and disorder. Understanding what the “flesh” is, has extremely practical implications for the life of faith and the orientation of one’s focus with regard to sanctification.We all know the “flesh” is bad and we should be against it, therefore the identification of this enemy is crucial in warring against it. In the last post I employed the methodology that we start with the solution and then explicate the problem rather than vice versa. Instead of beginning with a description of the flesh, we first described the nature of the Spirit and then were able to discern the contours of our enemy “the flesh.” In that post we looked at the Spirit through the lens of eschatology. Now we will look at the Spirit through the lens of the Trinity and seek to explicate “the flesh” from that perspective.

The doctrine of the Trinity tells us that God’s own being resides in the inter-relations between Father, Son and Spirit. The foundational underlying reality of God’s being is not the individual persons of the Godhead, but their communion of love with each other. Since humans are made in God’s image, this tells us that contrary to Boethius, the “basic atomic reality of humanity,” the essential indivisible constituency of humanity is not the individual, but the community. The existence of the community is ontologically and biologically prior to the individual. Our true humanity is only expressed, not as individuals, but as persons in loving relationship. This illuminates the fundamental characteristic of holiness – perfect love. The holy person is the person who loves in relationships. Notions of holiness cannot be abstract, detached or impersonal. Rather, they must be concrete, involved and relational.

The Trinitarian understanding of human relationality also illuminates the negative dimensions of human existence that holiness and sanctification seek to overcome. Sin is often understood as either “pride” or alternatively “self-centeredness.” Advocates of both views often claim Augustinian grounding. Some see understanding “self-centeredness” as an improvement over “pride” in that it is rooted in a Trinitarian theology of love. Sin is disordered and inwardly focused love rather than simply pride. The phronema tes sarkos, the “mindset of the flesh” is thus understood as a “self-centered mind-set” or “mind set purely on human goals and values.” The problem with humanity is that it is inwardly bent in pursuit of self-sovereignty, self-glorification, self-promotion, self-sufficiency, self-importance and self-gratification.

However, what the doctrine of the Trinity tells us is that we cannot allow the individual to be the fundamental unit of reality. Thus our foundational concepts of sin and depravity cannot be at center individualistic. Sin and the flesh cannot be confined to the isolated disorder of the individual. They cannot solely be understood or explicated in terms of self-centeredness. They cannot be explained only with reference to the self if it is truly impossible to rescind one’s relational nature. As long as one exists in relationship, others are involved. Therefore the nature of sin and the disordered motivation of the flesh are better viewed as an active anti-love or even hatred towards others. One’s attitudes towards one’s self and the actions of one’s self always involve others in the form of their presence or absence.

Self-sovereignty always means other-subjugating. Self-glorification always means other de-valuing. Self- promotion always means other-diminishing. Self-sufficiency always means other-rejection. Pursuit of self-importance always means other-insignificance. Misbegotten self-gratification always entails the utilitarian exploitation of others or the refusal to be generous to others. The sin of “self” is in fact not merely the “sin of self.” It must always be interpreted and articulated in the light of the relationality that one fails to exist without. Hence, these self-bending sins are all in fact forms of anti-love, or even hatred.

This demonstrates that the application of the centrality of relationality to harmartiology (the doctrine of sin) does not “reduce” a concept of sin. Humans are not in fact indicted for “selfishness” alone but for various forms of hatred and violence against others. The concept of sin through the doctrine of the Trinity seems to actually radicalize the doctrine of sin. This furthermore necessitates that any solution to the notion of sin, as manifested in a form of positive holiness and sanctification, must radically address that while humans have an insatiable craving for relationship and an instinctual urge to abscond their unavoidable sense of loneliness, they simultaneously possess an, at times insidious and at times unambiguous, fear, aversion and hostility towards the very thing they crave.

Spirit and Flesh – Part 1

Richard — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 23:59:34 +0000

The Biblical discussion of the concepts of “flesh” and “spirit” are highly problematic for several reasons. “Flesh” is one of the grand enemies of the Christian, along with the “world” (another problematic term) and the “devil” (yet another problematic term…). Hence the Christian must “war against the flesh.” As long as this remains theoretical, no problems will surface. Difficulties appear, however, as soon as one seeks to locate this “flesh” and fight against it. What does Paul mean by “flesh?” The simplest answer is a vague approximation between “flesh” and either materiality or bodily existence. I once had someone, when explaining what “flesh” was, dramatically pinch and pull the skin on his arm to make explicitly concrete this vile affiliation with the body. Another thorny interpretation of “flesh” is to call it the “sinful nature” (as unfortunately the NIV and alas the TNIV translate the greek word sarx, literally “flesh”). The Bible NEVER explicitly speaks of a “sinful nature” (except in the NIV…). Nature means what is inherent and essential. If sin is thus inherent or essential to human existence, that would invalidate an original state of innocence (thus excluding a concept of a “fall”) and make an existence without sin in the age to come impossible. Sin is never part of the central, inviolable identity of human beings. As long as humans live on earth the stranglehold of sin can be broken and exposed as the alien obtrusion that it is. Albiet, I understand what people mean when they say “sinful nature” and would not deny the depraved state of humanity. Nevertheless, “sinful nature” IS NOT a biblical term and I believe it is not the best way to express the brokenness of humanity. This however, is well beside the point…

The crux of the issue is that the interpretation of flesh in correlation with bodily or essential human existence opens the door for quasi-gnosticism. Gnosticism in a nut shell is the ancient (and heretical) belief that (for simplicity’s sake) matter is inherently evil (has an evil/sinful nature) and spirit is good. The good spirits of people are trapped in wicked bodies and need to be released by an enlightened spirit messenger and by the acquisition of a higher knowledge (gnosis). Gnosticism was the PRIMARY heresy that the early church combated, precisely because from the beginning of the church it was the most destructive idea to authentic apostolic Christianity. This idea subtly continues in the church when we ascribe a bad or inferior status to the material world or specifically our bodies. This belief slowly, yet thoroughly deconstructs the meaning and power of apostolic doctrine in its belief of the goodness of God’s role as creator, his creation, the value of the life of the body and the renewal of the earth (check the tags “Gnosticism” and “new creation” for more on this).

This problem stems from a common approach to interpreting Paul, and the gospel in general, to first outline the “problem” for only then can the solution be understood. Rudolf Bultmann epitomized this view when he said, “after man-under-the-Law has been made to see his situation under it as that of the ‘miserable wretch’ groaning for deliverance from the ‘body of death’, he can then see the salvation-occurrence as salvation-bringing.” Thus we look first at the problem – the problem is the flesh – and then discern the solution – opposing, eliminating or escaping the flesh.

E.P. Sanders has suggested that for Paul, the dilemma is not self-evident, but the solution provided in the Gospel illuminates the dilemma. This line of thought can be fruitful for understanding the flesh-Spirit conflict. “Flesh” is not primarily seen as negative in itself. It is only in light of the solution provided in the gospel that “flesh” is then seen as negative.

Flesh in the Old Testament speaks of corporate humanity in their weakness and fragility. This was not seen as evil, but was understood as an inevitable reality of existence. All living beings came from the dust and to the dust they will return (Gen. 18:27; Ps 103:14; Eccles 12:7; cf. 1 Cor. 15:47). However, in the NT, particularly in Paul, “flesh” takes on an unprecedented and unequivocal negative meaning. Here it is not because of any kind of inherent evil nature of literal flesh, but rather because of a dramatic alteration in the situation previously described. Whereas formerly “flesh” described the negative but inevitable weakness that characterized human solidarity, the resurrection of Jesus has introduced a radical newness. The “inevitability” of the corruption and death of flesh is no longer such. Its overcoming has not only been envisaged but has in fact been actualized in and through the resurrection of Jesus. As resurrection and the Spirit functioned as synecdoches (a figure of speech in which a part is made to represent the whole or vice versa) for God’s entire eschatological restoration program, so “flesh” becomes a synecdoche for all that God is renewing, restoring and replacing. “Flesh” is the dangling vestage of all that is contrary to God’s future for the world. Thus, the “mindset of the flesh” is not an “attachment to earthly-things.” How could one not be attached to earthly things? Humans are quite literally “earthlings” (the word for human in Hebrew is derived from the word for earth/ground). The mindset-of-the-flesh is rather that motivational force which seeks to maintain the status quo of sin, death, disorder, estrangement, alienation, suffering, injustice and unrighteousness over and against God’s work of new creation.

It is common to discuss the contrast of flesh and Spirit in terms of anthropology. However, this is not possible. First of all, “Spirit,” in the fullest Pauline sense, is not a fundamental component of human being, if it can be called a component of human being at all. Rather it is a person of the Godhead. To speak of Spirit in human anthropology would be to dangerously blur the distinction between God and humans. Furthermore, “flesh,” in Pauline terminology, cannot even be called a fundamental constituent of human nature either. Though often equated with the physical body, Paul’s discussion of the flesh shows us that this cannot be the case. In Romans 8:9 he tells the believers “you are not in the flesh if the Spirit of God dwells in you.” What could this sentence possibly mean if the word “flesh” means the body or even “the body with regard to its sinfulness?” To push the physicality of “flesh” renders Paul as ludicrous in this statement. Rather, “flesh” is a sphere that individuals can be “in” or “out” of, and thus cannot be part of the “nature” of humans. Nature refers to the essential characteristics of an entity. If humans can be outside the realm of “flesh,” then flesh cannot be essential to them. Hence it is not part of their nature.

Altogether, neither “flesh” nor “spirit” can be used to discuss human nature in a fundamental way. This illuminates that for Paul these terms do not function primarily anthropologically, but rather eschatologically. It is recognized by many biblical scholars today, that a fully Biblical understanding of the Spirit cannot be gained apart from the larger context of eschatology. A neat scholastic schematic that would appropriate “flesh” to the doctrine of anthropology, the Spirit as a component of soteriology and eschatology to a theological appendix (if not appendage) will never grasp the symphonic nature of Pauline thought concerning these terms. Passages like Isaiah 11:2; 42:1; 61:1 show how Jewish Messianic concepts were strongly linked to the concept of the Spirit. Passages like Isaiah 4; 32:15; 44:3; Joel 2:28ff and Ezekiel 36-37 link the Spirit to the eschatological restoration of the people of God and God’s world. The Spirit who played a critical role in creation (Gen. 1:2; Job 33:4; Ps. 33:6; 104:29) will be mightily operative to recreate God’s precious yet disfigured world.

The disparaging way Paul speaks of “flesh” is not remotely Gnostic. It does not make a gradation of “spiritual” over “natural” or “soul” over “body.” Rather the flesh is that which corresponds to the age of Adam and participates in its death-drives. It is that which is in allegiance with everything contrary to God’s kingdom, God’s future for the world, where there will be no more death, no more mourning, no more cry and no more pain. Wars will cease to the ends of the earth. The broken-heart will be bound up, the captive will be set free, the afflicted will be comforted. The entire created order will be renewed as righteousness, peace, joy and love flood the earth in the knowledge of God. To war against the flesh is to oppose, live in contradiction with and confront everything that seeks perpetuate that which God’s kingdom eradicates. It means to embody by the power of the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead, first in our own lives and relationships, that which will be true universally in the age of come. It means to appropriate now the “already” of the Kingdom and to refuse accommodation to the “not yet,” despite its persistence. Though sin reigned in death, grace now reigns through righteousness leading to eternal life in the Messiah Jesus. We have been united with Him in his death and resurrection and even now the life force of the spring-time of all creation lies resident within us. To war against the flesh is not to despise our bodily, physical, emotional, relational, and exceedingly conflicted existence. Rather in the midst of the great conflict between a dying world which is passing away and a new world which is coming to birth in the midst of it, we are called to wholeheartedly embrace and love life as agents of new creation, to be the sphere in which the power of regeneration is made operative – for through us God will send forth his spirit and renew the face of the earth (Ps 104:31).

The Person and History of the Holy Spirit Part 2: Trinitarian Ecstasy (cont.)

Richard — Sun, 19 Aug 2007 09:58:31 +0000

Previously, we discussed how the Scripture describes the very nature of the Spirit as fellowship or relationship. Not only does fellowship constitute the essential nature of the Holy Spirit, but Scripture seems to indicate that the Holy Spirit himself is indeed love itself. This concept finds its seed and foundation in the fourth chapter of 1 John and was later extensively developed in Augustine’s work on the Trinity.

12: No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us…
16b: God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.

13: By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit.

In verses twelve and sixteen love brings forth the abiding of God. In verse thirteen, the Spirit takes that role. In fact, in either verse, Spirit and love seem virtually interchangeable. Paul adds an additional insight when he adds that “God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us” (Romans 5.5)

Altogether, we see that “the gift of God is the Holy Spirit. The gift of God is love. God communicates himself in the Holy Spirit as love.” The Holy Spirit is Love itself. “The basic and central meaning of what the Holy Spirit is and what he effects is ultimately not “knowledge” but love.”

What sets the Holy Spirit apart, that is, what makes the Spirit Holy, His set-apart-ness is love. This gives us a crucial window into the “wholly otherness of God.” God’s holiness, his transcendence is not abstractly manifest apophatically, but concretely in love and relationship.

Apophatic theology refers to a theological method in which God’s nature is expressed through negations. Because God is infinite and uncreated any actual description would be false. Examples include:

Self-existence – God’s existence is un-derived
Self-sufficiency – God’s existence is non-dependent
Eternity understood as a-temporality (timelessness)
Infinitude – without limits
Simplicity – God is in-divisible
Immutability – without change
Immovability – without movement, unable to be moved
Omnipresence – in-definable by any of our concepts of space and location

This passage indicates to us that God’s transcendence, specifically the holiness of the Spirit is not primarily to be found it negative descriptions of God, but in love. Love forms the foundation of a cataphatic theology, in which we can truly make affirmations about a God whose essential nature is relationship. His essential nature is not difference. Such would be impossible. Neither is the most we can say about God that which concerns difference. Such would make him utterly unknowable.

Certain theologians throughout history have only been confident about understanding God through the negations of all we know (matter, earth, time, space, even ourselves). Understanding God in the fellowship of the Spirit, the Spirit who is love (indeed the God who is love), we can be confident in affirmations about a God who has made himself known beyond the difference that exists between us.

The Person and History of the Holy Spirit Part 2: Trinitarian Ecstasy

Richard — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 03:02:10 +0000

Last time I began discussing the need to understand spirituality, the present activity of the Spirit in our lives, through a Biblical understanding of the person of the Holy Spirit as revealed in his primary roles in history. Through looking at the history of the Holy Spirit we hope to learn about the person of the Holy Spirit. By this route we hope to more clearly understand spirituality via pneumatology (the doctrine of the Holy Spirit).

Our study of the Holy Spirit’s history must find its initial bearings in the infinite and eternal Fellowship of the Trinity. The Holy Spirit comes to us ever only as one of the distinct but inseparable persons of the triune God. Everything we understand and express about the Holy Spirit must have its foundation on the revelation of the Trinity, the God who has not, does not and will not exist apart from relationship. One of the most fundamental articulations we can make concerning the Spirit is that forever He has and will be a member of the most deeply enjoyable, poignantly loving and profoundly ecstatic communities of persons in existence. This is the chronological starting point for understanding the Spirit’s person and work, since before the world was born the Spirit possessed eternal pre-existence. In this pre-existence, the Spirit’s primary occupation was the enjoyment of the intra-trinitarian relationships.

2 Corinthians 13.14 – “May the grace of the Lord Jesus the Messiah, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.”

In this verse it is curious as to why fellowship is specially linked with the Spirit, while grace with the Messiah and love with the Father. It seems that the Spirit’s unique role and offering in redemption is fellowship, koinonia. This fellowship is a deep interpersonal sharing, the participation of one person in the life of another. Koinonia is shared life.

What is the fellowship that the Spirit gives? The fellowship of believers with himself? The Spirit’s fellowship in the Trinity? Fellowship between all believers? It is difficult to know with certainty if only one of these is intended. It seems that the Spirit both gives and forges community by his presence and also brings people into fellowship with Himself.

If the Spirit does not only bring people into fellowship, but is himself a participant in the community he creates, and he himself becomes their sharing in each other, then fellowship is not simply something the spirit gives, it is something he himself is. Fellowship is the Spirit’s own elemental nature. The fellowship is truly the fellowship of the Spirit.

The Spirit only exists as part of the Trinitarian relations with the Father and the Son. There the Spirit is fully engaged in an eternal movement of vibrant delight, love and self-giving. It is out of that fellowship that the Spirit is sent forth and it is in correspondence to that fellowship that the Spirit fashions fellowship with and amongst believers. The Spirit proceeds from the triune life of relationality and opens that fellowship for human beings to participate in.

This fellowship is “with you all.” This means that it is a dynamically open fellowship. Despite the many problems and difficulties that existed in the Corinthian community, all were invited to participate in the triune life of God. All were invited to partake of a shared life together with each other and God.

Here we learn that first and foremost, the Holy Spirit operates in and for relationship. Our first consideration in any present interpretation of the Spirit and its activity must take into account its eternal occupation and preoccupation. Ever and always the Spirit is consumed in love, receiving, giving, fashioning and forming relationships of deep and intimate affection.

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