Archive for the ‘By John Stonecypher’ Category
Is your conscience evil?
Filed under: Bible, By John Stonecypher, Christian Living, Relationships |
Comments (2) Mine is. At least sometimes. The letter to the Hebrews encourages us to “draw near [to Papa] with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience” (Heb 10.22 – KJV). Apparently, an evil conscience is a problem we all have, but from which Jesus has provided an escape.
Now, a conscience is not an innately bad thing; in fact, it’s quite a good thing. Reality is full of boundaries, and my conscience is my sense that I have crossed one, that I have violated reality, that I have treated someone in a way that is not appropriate to who and what they are. The conscience, in this sense, is what psychologists call “healthy shame.” It’s a whole-body feeling that says “I don’t like what I just did.” Not feeling healthy shame is the mental illness that afflicts sociopaths.
But my shame can become unhealthy when, instead of evaluating my behaviors, I start evaluating ME. I stop saying “That behavior is not acceptable,” and I start saying “I am not acceptable.” Big difference. Psychologists call this “toxic shame.” Toxic shame is the sense of being fundamentally flawed and beyond hope of repair. And if I believe I am bad, I will repeated “prove” that belief by doing bad things.
This is the evil conscience in action. It starts with my fallen humanity, with Adam’s delusion ringing in my ears: “I am unacceptable and must therefore hide in the bushes.” I proceed to filter my whole life though that belief. When I do something hurtful, it is proof of my belief. When I do something good, I find a way to explain it away as an irrelevant anomaly. If someone hates me, I accept it as further evidence that I am bad. If someone loves me, I think “If they only knew the real me…”
I hope this kind of thinking sounds utterly foreign to you. I pray that is the case. But if my description of this problem rings true for you (as it does for me), hear the gospel now:
By the will of God, you “have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all” (Heb 10.10). Jesus did the work of making you holy, and then “he sat down” because the work was DONE (10.12). He did the work of making you perfect forever (10.14), and then he stopped working. Your evil conscience will make it hard for you to believe this, but he has already washed you clean of the dirt you’ve gotten on yourself by whatever foolish choices you’ve made in life (10.22b). This is the truth, whether you believe it or not. Therefore, join with Jesus in the work of aligning your heart with this truth (10.22a), through the daily hard work of accepting the truth and rejecting lies. In this process, you will be filled with the assurance of faith that draws you ever-deeper into the life of the Father, Son and Spirit.
A Palm Sunday prayer
Filed under: Bible, By John Stonecypher, Scripture Paraphrases, Worship |
Comments (3) (from Psalm 24)
Wonderful Papa, the earth is yours.
You treasure us, your children who live on it.
For you made us out of the Nothing,
Established us as dry land on the sea.
United with you in your Son,
We are the ones who ascend your hill
And stand whole before your affectionate gaze.
We are the possessors of your Son’s clean hands and pure heart.
He has lifted our souls to you and to no other.
In Him we have received blessing and salvation from your hand.
In Him we are the generation that seeks you face and finds it.
We lift up our heads and throw open our gates
That Jesus the King of glory may come in.
He is the I-AM, strong and mighty,
The I-AM, mighty against all who would destroy us.
We lift up our heads and throw open our gates
That Jesus the King of Glory may come in.
He is I-AM the Almighty,
The King of Glory.
St. Patrick and the “middle” issues
One of the big things I learn from St. Patrick is to not spend all my time in the clouds. I tend to like to think in the abstract, in the lofty and ethereal. It’s the result of a subtle background belief I have, the belief that regular everyday things are not beautiful. That the Triune Life is more present in filet mignon than in oatmeal, more present in Bach than in my own unskilled guitar strummings.
But brother Patrick breaks me of such nonsense. Patrick was great at high-minded theologizing, but he was famous for not spending all his time there. Nor did he spend time on “low” issues that didn’t matter, like gossip about what’s happening in the village hut next door. No, Patrick was known for his love of the “middle” issues of everyday life.
Because Patrick knew that the Great Dance flowed through all things, the Celtic tradition includes some of the most beautiful things — prayers about starting the morning fire, walking to the well, and mending cracked door-frames. Songs about catching fish, cooking dinner, and weeding the garden. One Celtic monk is famous for the epic poem he wrote about his cat.
That is what I learn from St. Patrick this year. That my life is so much more beautiful then I ever thought possible. Thank you, Holy Spirit, for inspiring Brother Patrick’s eyes to see, and for now teaching me the same lesson.
Narrative spiritual formation
For a long time, I’ve been a fan of “narrative theology,” a way of doing theology in which STORIES are seen as central, rather than merely the timeless principles we can derive from stories. We can note that the Bible is mostly stories, although we preachers often seem to think it should be full of bullet-pointed theological treatises with application points at the end. The Nicene Creed, if you look at it, is a story — a story about what God did and is doing and will do. We all have a story, and our story is bound up with the story the Bible tells, which is ultimately the story of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit.
Anyway, for a long time, I was trying to invent a narrative approach to spiritual formation. Rather than just telling people to apply various biblical principles and practices in their life, how could I give people the story of God in a way that it could shape each person’s individual story of life?
What I ended up discovering is that the Body of Christ has been practicing narrative spiritual formation for centuries, through the practice of the Christian Calendar and the fixed-hour prayers.
Because Jesus is the hub of all time, his life is what gives meaning to time. In the practice of fixed-hour prayers, we experience each hour of the day as a participation in Jesus’ life. We rise with Jesus in the morning, experience his joy and pain throughout the day, and at the end of the day we commit our souls into his hands (You might recognize this from the classic “Now I lay me down to sleep” prayer).
The Christian year is the same thing, just at the scale of a year. We share in Christ’s birth at Christmas. He is revealed at Epiphany, and we are revealed with him. We suffer with him at Lent, die with him on Good Friday, rise with him on Easter, and ascend with him on Ascension Sunday. All through the long Pentecost season we share in his Spirit-powered mission in the world, and at Advent we anticipate and experiences his Coming. And since the resurrection is the source of the whole thing, we re-enact it every Sunday morning.
Narrative spiritual formation. I’m not as ingenious and cutting-edge as I thought. =)
Time to walk away
When in conversation with someone about the gospel, when is it time to admit they aren’t interested in listening, that they just want to fight, and that it’s a waste of time to continue the conversation?
I find myself in this situation more than usual lately. I look at Jesus, and he never seemed bothered by people walking away from him. There were instances where HE walked away from THEM. How do you know when it’s time to do that?
I, unlike Jesus, have a bit of a Messiah complex. I feel a need to save people, to fix them. I’ve learned that this impulse arises from a core belief that people are incompetent losers, that they are hopeless unless I fix them. I’ve made a lot of progress in un-learning that belief, but I feel it raising its ugly head again lately.
There is nothing wrong with my wanting people to know Jesus for who he is. What is unhealthy is my NEED for them to see. It’s almost as if THEY see it, then it will make it easier for ME to see it. It will be confirmation that I’m right.
So to walk away is painful to me. It pokes at my doubts. It looks to the other person like I’ve given up, that I’m admitting defeat in our argument.
Jesus does not indulge in such foolishness. He didn’t need the affirmation that comes from his opponents coming to agree with him. Which means I don’t need it either. He follows Father, and that’s enough. For him and for me.
When I’m done with a conversation, it’s okay for me to say “Let me know how that works out for you,” and walk away.
Perhaps this can be part of my Lenten discipline. Not winning. Letting Jesus win in his own way.
~ by John Stonecypher
Ashes
Filed under: By John Stonecypher, Christian Living, Trinity, Worship |
Comments (1) It’s Ash Wednesday, and my thoughts turn to Job, sitting on his pile of ashes, scratching himself. The big deal about Job is that his suffering didn’t make sense to him (or to anyone reading his story). And it always frustrated me that his questions never got answered. Job gets the same response that my 7-year-old sometimes gets from me:
“Because I said so, that’s why. I love you, but please stop asking.”
As a parent, I know that it’s not always possible to give a satisfactory explanation to a child. So intellectually, I understand how Father just sometimes has to say: “Trust me on this one.”
Jesus is the only one who ever really said “OK Dad, I know you’ve got my back.” Confronted with that, I come face to face with my distrust in my Father.
My faith is ashes.
Blows away in the slightest breeze.
Today, with a smear of gray schmutz on my forehead, I acknowledge the ashfulness of my much-vaunted faith. But inside this acknowledgement is the proclamation that my glorious-as-ashes faith is not what binds Father to me. “I live by the faithfulness of the Son of God” (Gal 2.20). There is a knowing, an accurate knowing, a FAITHFUL knowing between Son and Father in the Spirit. A faith and a faithfulness that is not ashes.
~ John Stonecypher
Gender
I have been playing with a SHACK version of my Bible paraphrase, and I’ve run into the issue of gender. I am referring to the Father as ‘Papa’ and to the Spirit as ‘Sarayu.’ And it occurred to me if I want to be speaking the scriptures in SHACK language, then I should refer to both of them as ‘she’ and ‘her.’
It’s fascinating how jarring a feminine pronoun can be. And I think the jarring is good. Paul Young wanted to yank people out of their ruts and just get them to start thinking in fresh ways. The depiction of Papa as a woman certainly does that.
But it still feels weird. Because I know gender is theologically relevant. There is nothing of the feminine that is lacking in God, but still, Jesus prayed to his Father, not his Mother, and there’s a REASON for that. I know from being a parent that the father-child relation is not interchangeable with the mother-child relation. Besides, Jesus HAD a mother; her name was Mary, and he was never interested in praying to her.
I’ve read Gary Deddo’s stuff where he grounds human gender differences in the Triune life. I thought that stuff was interesting, but it’s still foggy to me. If I recall correctly, Gary says the Father plays a masculine role as giver, while Jesus plays a feminine role (in relation to the Father) as a receiver of the Father’s gifts. But in that case, does that mean we should be calling Jesus “she”? That doesn’t sound right.
Anyway, I’m really just wrestling today; I don’t have answers to these questions. Anybody got some feedback for me?
– John Stonecypher
Amazing Wrath, How Sweet the Sound
Filed under: By John Stonecypher, Christian Living, Gospel, Love, Relationships, Trinity | Tags: Christian Living, Christianity, Church, Jesus, Theology
Comments (9) When I was a kid, I thought anger was a bad thing. The only anger I knew about was the kind of anger that said “You hurt me, so I need to hurt you.” I thought the purpose of anger was to inflict pain. Growing up, I didn’t like that the people around me were angry. And I hated the idea of God being angry.
From a very early age, I coped with anger by ignoring it, by denying it and refusing to express it. I became so good at suppressing my angry feelings, I learned to not even experience them. Anger was inside me, but I taught myself to be blind and numb to it.
It sounded like a good idea at the time. I never got mad; I thought it was a wonderful character trait. I sometimes even found myself wishing that God could be as understanding and patient as me [Pause for lightning bolt to smite John].
But as I came into adulthood, I discovered that when anger is inside, it eventually gets out. I looked at my life and saw a lifetime of passive-aggressive behavior that I hadn’t even noticed. I had gone through life, spreading subtle unkindness wherever I went. And sometimes it wasn’t so subtle. My anger issues came to a head one day when, in the middle of a crowd of people, I assaulted a total stranger.
That is a day I don’t like to talk about. But I want to be open about it because it was a turning point in my life. That day I learned some ugly truths about myself. I learned that I – “gentle, patient, long-suffering John” — had a serious problem with anger, that my problem was out of my control, that it was harming innocent people, and that I needed help.
In the years of therapy and hard work after that day, I learned that anger is supposed to be my friend. Anger is my body’s biochemical way of telling me that my boundaries are being violated, that I am being harmed in some way. That anger is an important part of any healthy relationship between free persons. That anger can be expressed (and that my boundaries can be protected) without malice and vengeance.
I will spend the rest of my life coping with my anger issues. I am learning to accept the fact that I can’t take back the hurt I’ve caused, and that my past actions have broken some relationships beyond my ability to repair them. By accepting and confessing these unpleasant truths about myself, I have become able to experience forgiveness – receiving it and giving it.
The truth has judged me, saved me, and set me free.
Among the many freedoms I have gained, I have become free to know God more fully. I have come to accept and embrace his wrath. My Father’s fiery anger is part of who He is, a GOOD part. He has claimed the human race as his children, and he has drawn a line in the sand (a boundary) between his children and the forces that threaten to darken and destroy us. And he has set the full weight of his infinite Being against anything that would violate that boundary.
His wrath burns against the darkness that caused some people to harm me when I was a kid. His wrath burns against the darkness that caused me to pass that harm onto others. His wrath burns against the darkness that haunts me every time I have to decide whether I will deal with my anger in healthy ways.
But I know the Good News: Darkness has no future, because my Father’s wrath has prevailed.
~ John Stonecypher
The Spirit of Adoption
Filed under: Bible, By John Stonecypher, Christian Living, Gospel, Scripture Paraphrases, The Plan of Adoption, Trinity | Tags: Christianity, Church, Gospel, Jesus, Perichoresis, Romans, Trinity
Leave a comment A Trinitarian, Christ-centered paraphrase of Romans 8.14-27
(14) The Holy Spirit is leading you deeper into your true life as Papa’s child. (15) He is not a spirit of bondage and fear. He is the Spirit of Adoption, the Spirit who puts Jesus’ sonship inside of us. When we cry out “Papa! Daddy! Father!” (16) it is the Holy Spirit who is speaking the truth from inside OUR spirit. The truth that we ARE Papa’s children, (17) the truth that we are the inheritors of the super-abundant life Jesus shares with Papa. And of course, sharing in his glorious life means sharing in his sufferings as well. (18) But be encouraged: The pain we’re experiencing now—and indeed, all the suffering in the history of the world—is NOTHING compared to the boundless joy and strength for which we are destined.
(19) We aren’t the only ones in pain. The whole universe groans as it waits for the full unveiling of the human race as Papa’s children, as it longs for us to step up the plate and play our assigned role in the cosmos. (20) For the universe itself is slowly winding down, running out of gas, moving slowly toward its own death. Papa chose to restrict his creation in this way, (21) with the intent of eventually moving it beyond those limitations. The day will come when the cosmos will be free from its chains of slow decay. The very fabric of space-time will be transformed in the luminous freedom of Papa’s children in the world. (22) The old created order will give birth to New Creation, but in the meantime, the universe writhes and groans in the pain of childbirth. (23) We ourselves are experiencing that pain now, because through the Spirit we have already tasted the fruit of the new world. We groan inwardly as we long for more, as we wait for the full effect of our adoption—the liberating transformation of our bodies.
(24) We were saved so that we would have a future! The Triune Life was given to us with an eye toward a glorious future in which that Life would fill the cosmos to overflowing. This is our sure hope, and hope by definition involves stuff we don’t yet see. (25) We hope for what we can’t see yet, and because of this hope the Spirit has given us, we can be content while we wait. (26) This is the way the Spirit’s strength makes up for our weakness. When we don’t know how to talk to Papa, it is his Spirit in us who does the talking for us, expressing what’s inside us in ways too deep for words. (27) The Holy Spirit knows us deep in the guts of our soul, and he shares his knowing with Papa.
~ John Stonecypher
Trinitarian Economics
Filed under: By John Stonecypher, Christian Living, Gospel, Trinity | Tags: Christian Living, Christianity, Church, Economics, Gospel, Jesus, Perichoresis, Trinitarian Theology, Trinity
Comments (27) Traditional economic theory is all about how people compete for scarce resources, as if Me-Getting-What-I-Want is the center of the universe. But what if the center of the universe is occupied by something (or Someone) else?
The word “economy” has beautiful roots in Greek, evoking the image of making a home (Greek: oikos) for yourself and your family. The truest economics class you ever took was Home Ec. Because the reality of economics begins and ends in the Triune life—Jesus, his Dad, and their Spirit, each one being “at home” in each other’s life, and each one working to make himself a home for the others.
But it doesn’t stop there. The Triune Home-Making decided to open itself, to make itself the home of others. There were no “others” yet, so Father, Son and Spirit made some. They began the hard work of including finite creatures into their infinite life. We made messes on their floor. We stuck things into our mouths that weren’t food. We were reluctant to share our toys with each other. Housebreaking us was a messy, painful business for the Triune persons. They re-arranged their life in unthinkable ways, so that they could live in ways that are hospitable to us. In short, they made their shared life into a home for us. And it was their joy to do it.
This is the ground and grammar of economics. What does that say about human economic life, which lives and moves and has its being within the Triune economy? Some preliminary observations and questions:
- Economics is primarily about persons and their relationships.
- The point of economics is hospitality.
- Hospitality is primarily about self-giving, and only secondarily about stuff-giving.
- The giving of goods and services is secondary, not primary.
- Hospitality is costly to the giver; it involves sacrifice.
- It is up to the giver to decide if the cost is worth paying.
- Hospitality is other-centered.
- Hospitality is motivated by love.
- Hospitality is the driver of creativity and innovation.
- At the most fundamental level, economic relationships are mutual. They involve giving AND receiving.
- At the most fundamental level, economic relationships are free. They are covenantal rather than contractual.
- At the most fundamental level, economic transactions are gifts. Whatever else buying-and-selling is, it is a form of gift exchange.
- The ultimate product of economic activity is joy.
- The Triune economy is incarnate in the earthly human economy. The Triune mutual gift-giving is present (in varying degrees of pleasure and pain) in every human economic transaction.
- The earthly human economy involves clouded, darkened minds that see reality with less than perfect clarity.
- Therefore, the human economy involves fear, dishonesty, and malice.
- It is fitting and good for humans to protect themselves from economic predators.
- A contract is a tool for clarifying economic transactions and making people safe from predation within the system.
- Can a covenantal relationship have contracts in it? In other words, can my friend also be my customer? I don’t see why not.
- What does it mean for a piece of creation to become my “property”?
- Or to put it another way, how does a piece of creation come under my stewardship?
- Is poor stewardship a form of theft (For example, if I poison a well, am I robbing future generations)?
- If poor stewardship is theft, what role does human government have in enforcing basic standards of stewardship?
- In what ways is my neighbor’s well-being under my stewardship? In what ways is it not?
~ John Stonecypher