The Cruciform God: Deep Magic — Why Jesus Had to Die

Posted on April 4, 2010 by Jay F Guin

We’re continuing our study of Michael J. Gorman’s Inhabiting the Cruciform God.

So why did Jesus have to be crucified? I don’t pretend to have the complete answer. I don’t, I’m sure. But I think I have a glimpse of part of the underlying truth.

(Heb 5:7-10)  During the days of Jesus’ life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission. 8 Although he was a son, he learned obedience from what he suffered 9 and, once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him 10 and was designated by God to be high priest in the order of Melchizedek.

Jesus “learned obedience” through his sufferings. And this made him “perfect.”

We wrestle with the idea of the Son of God being “made” perfect, as though he wasn’t already sinless. And he was already sinless. Continue reading →

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N. T. Wright’s After You Believe: Regarding Denominationalism, For Discussion

Posted on April 3, 2010 by Jay F Guin

Regarding denominationalism —

Our denominations, with all their ambiguities and puzzles, are often rooted in the very kind of ethnic distinctions or personality-based divisions which Paul went out of his way to combat. Perhaps that is one reason why moral discussions in the church tend to go round and round in small circles on a few favored issues, especially sex: discussing how, why, and when two human beings come together in a loving or quasi-loving act may be, after all, a displacement activity when we can’t cope with the question of how, why, and when a whole family of Christians should (but can’t) come together in mutual love and support. That doesn’t mean that sexual ethics are unimportant. On the contrary, they are symptomatic of the health or unhealth of the wider community. But we shouldn’t focus all our worries on the fact that the church secretary has run off with the organist’s spouse when the promised unity of Jesus Christ with all his people is flouted by structures and customs — and sometimes, yes, theology! — which destroy the fabric of the church just as surely as adultery destroys the fabric of the community.

(pp. 209-210). Wright is an Anglican bishop in England. He’s part of his denomination’s denominational structure — and yet he considers denominational division a worse sin than adultery. I agree. Disunity of God’s church is one of the greatest of all sins. It doesn’t excuse any other sin, but unity is of the essence.

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Rethinking Easter

Posted on April 3, 2010 by Jay F Guin

In the traditional Easter celebration, we honor Jesus by — Continue reading →

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The Fork in the Road: Learning from the History of Worship, Part 3

Posted on April 3, 2010 by Jay F Guin

Biblical origins of worship

If we were entirely ignorant of the Patristics and the modern American church, we’d struggle to know how to worship based just on the New Testament. We’d see in the Old Testament where true worship only took place in Jerusalem, and we’d see where Jesus said that worship will be changed to be “in Spirit and in truth” — defined by God’s Holy Spirit and the gospel of Jesus Christ.

We’d see in the synoptic Gospels and 1 Corinthians where Jesus instituted the Lord’s Supper as part of a meal.

We’d see in 1 Cor 14 where the early church assembled for mutual edification, strengthening, encouragement, and comfort — and we’d see that the New Testament is filled with encouragement to deal well with persecution. No wonder they met for encouragement! Continue reading →

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Church Finances and Business: Further on the Housing Allowance

Posted on April 2, 2010 by Jay F Guin

I get emails —

A 2005 presentation (Tax and Legal Guide for Elders: Tax Law for Church Leaders) of yours led me to a question I am hoping you can answer. On page 6 you write —

“c) Housing allowances are OK for retired clergy. d) BUT not for surviving spouses.”

Do you know if there is any legal way for a church to pay $500 a week to a retired minister and, upon his death, continue paying $500 a week to his surviving widow for the rest of her life? My impression is that it would be illegal to do this, but I am unclear on whether or not it is illegal only if you call it Housing Allowance or if it is illegal under any circumstances. If the church wants to pay her and not call it Housing Allowance is it a simple matter of her having to declare it on her taxes and pay taxes on it? Would the church not be in legal hot water and not incur penalties for having paid her $26,000 per year? Continue reading →

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Just Because It’s Friday

Posted on April 2, 2010 by Jay F Guin
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An Experiment in Christian Dialogue: A Post by Bruce Morton, Revised

Posted on April 2, 2010 by Jay F Guin

Angel with harpI usually post several days ahead — just in case something terrible happens, like a computer death — and to make sure I have time to repent of my posts before they go public. And I put Bruce’s post on the site several days before it actually appeared. Unfortunately, it was scheduled to appear on one of those days when I was in the midst of a computer salvage operation (still ongoing, by the way).

So although Bruce had told me a revised post was coming, I failed to take the old one down. Here’s his fuller post, with my apologies.

Ephesians 5:18-21: The Work of the Spirit Through Song in a World Under Siege

Bruce Morton

The teaching in Ephesians 5:18-21 by Paul has, at times, been discussed by itself – without taking into account the broader context.  Ephesians 4:17-5:21 includes important parallels that tie the teaching together.  For example, 5:18-21 parallels 5:11 and also reveals 4:23-24 applied to Christian worship.  When we focus on Paul’s teaching about song outside of the context, we leave behind why he says what he says. Continue reading →

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The Cruciform God: Righteousness and Faith, Part 3

Posted on April 2, 2010 by Jay F Guin

We’re continuing our study of Michael J. Gorman’s Inhabiting the Cruciform God. But as noted earlier, I’m improvising on a theme by Gorman. (You musical guys will understand.)

Back in Part 1, I concluded,

Through faith, we are credited both with obedience and with circumcision. And this explains why Paul says we cannot insist on circumcision as a test of salvation in Galatians, but it would also mean that we can’t insist on perfect obedience as a test of salvation. Do you see how it all fits together?

Just so, if we insist on perfect obedience to any law as a requirement to be saved, we also deny that we are saved by faith. If you think about our salvation in terms of God’s covenant with Abraham, it just makes sense.

And now Galatians should make a little better sense. If we were to insist on circumcision as a condition of salvation, we’d be effectively saying that faith isn’t good enough. Continue reading →

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The Sad Story of My Broken Computer

Posted on April 1, 2010 by Jay F Guin

It had to happen. All computers die. But it’s never good news. And my computer died on Saturday.

Well, it didn’t die so much as suffer from a case of senile dementia. The USB ports stopped working reliably, and that meant my network connection became unreliable, not to mention my printer and backup hard drive.

So the “good news” is that I had an excuse to buy a brand new computer — a Gateway with a quad-chip. Very cool. In theory. But this very fast computer runs some software known as “Windows 7” — also known as “We’ve hidden every control where you can’t find it and made your old software not work at all even though you spent 20 hours working on something called “Compatibility Mode” which really means “make-you-buy-all-new-software mode.”” Continue reading →

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Ranking the Top 25 Church of Christ Blogs

Posted on April 1, 2010 by Jay F Guin

FELLOW BLOGGERS: Just a reminder that Matt Dabbs and I are compiling data on progressive Church of Christ blogs for March 2010. Send your data either to me (jfguin(at)comcast(dot)net) or to Matt and we’ll announce the totals. See below for details announced back on February 20.

Matt Dabbs and I have been discussing the best way to rank Church of Christ blogs. Alexa and Google are useful tools but have serious weaknesses and produce wildly inconsistent results. Technorati seems to have stopped ranking blogs altogether.

As a result, ranking blogs using these services produces some peculiar results. For example, despite its low Alexa score, Edward Fudge is certainly among the most influential websites, because most of Edward’s readers read by email subscription. And GraceConversation hasn’t been active for many months, and yet ranks higher than a number of websites that have much more activity.

We’ve concluded that, with some modifications, the number of Page Views is the best objective measure of the influence of a blog. Continue reading →

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