sick/sickening, as in, the 'church' is so in need of a makeover ...

If you've read the intro to this blog, you know one of the driving issues with me is 'where on Earth is the church Jesus built?' I have apologized for the reputation of the Christian church, have disavowed myself of several labels attached to that institution, and now simply am a follower of Jesus. You can go where you want to with that. Perhaps I'm too radical, rebellious, looking for trouble, trying to get attention for myself, on the rebound from failed religion/church/doctrine, blah blah blah ... it's cool.

I heard a comment recently that upended my brain. After sweeping up what was left of it, I thought, "this cannot be real". I did some research. What follows is the text of an article written in 2010. You decide. Any underlining, etc. is mine.

On a nationally syndicated radio program about a year ago, Alan Colmes interviewed the Rev. Wiley Drake, a pastor who once served as second vice president of the Southern Baptist Convention. In the course of this interview, Drake said that he regularly prays for the death of “the usurper that is in the White House, B. Hussein Obama.”

Stunned into disbelief, Colmes asked Drake several times to clarify himself, and each time this evangelical leader confirmed that he prays that God would use whatever means necessary to strike Obama dead. When a flabbergasted Colmes asked Drake why he would do such a thing, Drake responded that he “believes the whole Bible,” including the “imprecatory psalms” in which David prays for God to slay enemies.

Drake is certainly right when he says there are vengeful psalms in the Bible. In fact, some of them are absolutely ghoulish. For example, David prays that his enemies would be buried alive (Psalm 55:15) and celebrates the prospect of watching people smash the heads of his enemies’ babies against rocks (Psalm 137:9).

We evangelicals certainly want to believe “the whole Bible,” but does this mean we’re required to pray like this? I believe not only that are we notrequired to pray like this, we are forbidden to do so. For these prayers completely contradict the way Jesus instructs us to treat our enemies.

While David and others in the Old Testament often expressed hatred toward their enemies, Jesus commands us to love (agape) our enemies (Luke 6:27). David wanted God to smite his enemies, but Jesus commands us to pray that God would bless our enemies (Luke 6:28). David prayed for God to help him vanquish his enemies, but Jesus commands us to seek to do good to them (Luke 6:27).

David prayed that God would not forgive enemies, but Jesus illustrates with His last breath upon the cross that we are to ask God to forgive them (Luke 23:24). And while David often prayed for his enemies to die, Jesus dies for His enemies and commands us to adopt the same attitude (John 13:15; Luke 6:27-35; Romans 5:8; Ephesians 5:1-2; 1 Peter 2:19-23; 1 John 2:6).

Yes, we evangelicals confess that the whole Bible is divinely inspired, but we can’t regard every verse as carrying equal authority for us today. To the contrary, the New Testament makes it very clear that the authority of Jesus trumps all others. Jesus himself declares at one point, “I have testimonyweightier than that of John” (John 5:36, emphasis added).

Interestingly enough, Jesus regarded John to be the greatest of all the Old Testament prophets (Matthew 11:7-14). If Jesus’ testimony is to be given more weight than John’s, then it should certainly be given more weight than the other voices in the Old Testament, including David’s.

This is why we should not be surprised when we occasionally find Jesus replacing Old Testament commands with teachings of His own. Most famously, the Old Testament several times commanded “[e]ye for eye, and tooth for tooth,” but Jesus teaches us to “not resist an evil person” but to instead “love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven” (Matthew 5:38-39, 44-45, emphasis added).

Notice that while retaliating against enemies was allowed and sometimes even commanded in the Old Testament, acting this way after the advent of Christ disqualifies one from being considered a child of God. Something has clearly changed! We have moved from an old way of treating enemies under the Old Covenant to a new way of treating enemies under the New Covenant of Jesus Christ.

The change was clearly displayed as Jesus was traveling through Samaria on His way to Jerusalem. Several Samarian towns didn’t welcome the disciples, so James and John asked Jesus, “Do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” (Luke 9:54).

As vengeful as their request was, it had a precedent in the ministry of Elijah, who twice called down fire on people in that very location (2 Kings 1:7-17). One could argue that James and John were simply “believing the whole Bible.” Yet Jesus strongly rebuked them and, according to many of the oldest manuscripts, accused His disciples’ request of manifesting a different “spirit” than his own (Luke 9:55).

Think about it. Elijah calls down fire and is held up as a hero in the Old Testament, but had he done the same thing as a disciple of Jesus, he would have been rebuked and possibly accused of operating under a demonic influence!

Theologians and scholars have opinions about why there is this remarkable shift between the two Testaments. But no matter how it’s explained, it is perfectly clear that followers of Jesus are never permitted to appeal to the precedent of David, Elijah or anyone else in the Old Testament to justify treating enemies in ways that contradict the example and teachings of Jesus.

All of us have people we disagree with—even people we may call our “enemies”—but as Christ followers we’re called to bless them no matter who they are or what they’ve done. If any of us is tempted to pray otherwise, we should be prepared for a serious rebuke from our Lord Jesus!

Greg Boyd is senior pastor of Woodland Hills Church in St. Paul.

http://www.minnesota.christianexaminer.com/Articles/Aug10/Art_Aug10_oped2.html

I am a follower of Jesus. I will not desist from pointing to the misrepresentation of Jesus foisted on his sheep by the wolves who dress themselves in woolly clothes. Jesus regularly points to their hypocrisy, and upends their tables, their customs, and their man-made doctrines imposed on the sheep, who took it for granted that they were speaking for God as his representatives. Wicked!


shalom