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God is weak

>Powerful in a different way

>When it come to power, there is no doubt the something has happened to God.  I contend that it is a different kind of power, most go with other explanations.

I need to say up front here that I believe in ‘more than you can see’.  Admittedly I am not a big fan of the phrase “supernatural” because of the worldview that it comes from (as if the power of prayer was not the most natural thing in the world and the way that Jesus worked with nature and wants us to as well).

I need to say that at the beginning because if you did not know it, there will be points in this blog where someone could think that I do not believe in ‘more than you can see’.

Something about God – or a gap in how the Bible talks about power and what we see in our world –  has changed and there are so many ways that people have attempted to deal with it.

  • Enlightenment liberals often take the line of reasoning that God would never break the rules that God originally set up (such as physics). So the change must have been that the ancients only thought that Jesus walked on water  –  or that they were actually talking allegorically or poetically when they talked about such things.  Bottom Line : in this view those kind of miraculous things don’t happen anymore and probably never did.
  • Charismatic or Pentecostals, obviously, DO believe that miracles and acts of power still do – or can – happen. When they don’t  (and often they don’t) then reasons are looked for: not enough faith, not enough prayer, those who pray are not holy or dedicated enough. Bottom Line: This view says that the world works the same way it did in Bible times and God doesn’t change so if we are not seeing God’s power like they did – it must be on our end.
  • Dispensational folks say that God works differently in different periods in history (called dispensations) and after the Apostolic Age ( in the Book of Acts) we moved into the Church Age and miracles are not a part of our age. Bottom Line: in this view, God can do powerful things, has in the past, and will in the future… just not right now.
  • Even Barth (Karl Barth and those who like him) runs into the problem with a lack of power (like miracles). The explanation that developed in the last half of the 20th century is that because God’s fullest revelation was done in Christ then God has no need to do those kind of things since it was a ‘once for all’ revelation. Bottom Line: in this view the only thing that God would do (like in the Book of Acts) is to validate that original revelation. 
  • There are those voices that talk of the Death of God. You understand why this carried so much weight in the 20th century with the two world wars, atomic bombs, death camps, all the way the Bosnian war and Africa’s post-colonial realities (to name just a few). 

Bottom Line: for both the Barthians and the Death of God crew is that outside of emotional worship services or crusades… it was tough for many people to see how or where God was at. God seemed absent when things mattered most and some were left to reason that this supposedly ‘all powerful being’ either didn’t care, was not as powerful as advertised or was dead.

If you study history you can begin to see that something is definitely different.  Either the Ancients were under false illusions, or it is all some sort of Medieval superstition being exposed or there has been a death of ‘god’ power or  that God is choosing to do something a little different because these are the last days and this is all part of the plan. Whichever one you go with, you have some followup questions to deal with.

Fun Example: 
I love talking with Charismatic-Pentecostal believers who focus on the fact the demons and miracles are still a part of pre-Industrial (non-developed) parts of the world. They point to Africa and South America where stuff still happens like it did in the Book of Acts.
The question I ask is “so do demons lose their power when people have electricity ?”

I have had some really fun conversations around this!  It is a fascinating place to launch a dialogue. The most interesting response I have ever heard was by one of my best friends who told me that since believers have been binding demons by the power of the Holy Sprit for 2,000 years – that there just are not as many demons on the earth as there used to be.  I asked if they then congregate in places like rural Africa? After that the conversation got wild…

At the end of the day, however, I think that what all these approaches are addressing is more important that how they address it.  What they are addressing is that there is a gap between how the ancients perceived God and talked about power and what we have seen and experienced in our own world.   Something has changed.

Act 2: here is where I am at on this.  I think that we have a bad understanding of power and how it is that God works in the world.  I am not interested in discrediting people of the past – but neither am i interested in dogmatically clinging to a cosmology and meta-physics from a pre-scientific era. I want to deal with the world as it is. Not as I was taught that it should be and not as people used to think that it was… I am interested in an optimistic (hopeful) Christian realism.

I have bought into a school of thought that says God is in the process with us and that reality is relational. It’s interesting that I believe so many of the same things as I used to but that I think so radically differently about them. 

One example is of God’s power. I believe that God is powerful and I also believe that God is at work in the world.  The difference is that I now conceive of God’s power a little differently. I believe that God’s power is non-coercive. It is more seductive than unilateral. God works with what is. This view of power is more persuasive than coercive.

My favorite way of introducing this idea is a story that Marjorie Suchocki tells.

One day the Sun and the Wind were watching a man walk and decided to have a competition. The Wind challenged the Sun to see who could get the hat off of the man’s head. The man was walking and the wind began to blow and blow in an attempt to knock the hat off of the man’s head by sheer force.
The result was that the man placed his hand on his hat and pressed down with all his strength. In fact, the more the wind blew, the more the wind blew the harder the man resisted and worked to keep the hat on his head.
The Sun decided to go a different direction. The Sun was concerned with heloing the man to want to take his hat off – not simply doing it to the man but wanting to work with the man by helping him to desire for his hat to come off.
The Sun began to shine with great intensity and increased the temperature to such a point that the man became uncomfortable with how hot is was and willing reached up with his hand and took the hat off.

If the wind had succeeded – the man would have viewed it as a bad and undesirable thing. He had worked against it and would have tried to correct it.
The sun succeeded and the man perceived it as a good thing and even participate in bringing it about. The man may not have even been aware of the role that the environment played on his desires – thinking that it was his idea all along!

God is not the wind trying to knock the hat off our head with power.

God is the sun, influencing our environment in order to change our desires – so that God is not doing things to us but is working with us to bring about the greater good (also called the will of God).  

Act 3:  Paul Knitter talks about it in terms of the sail on a boat. Our will is not like a motor but an organized cloth that is anchored at strategic points. We put up our sail in order to harness that which is already at work (available). We can not manufacture it. We do not generate it. We do not direct it so much as harness and navigate it.

The everyday implication for these ideas is that we reframe how we talk about God’s power. The idea of the Puppet master pulling strings from behind the curtain and the unilateral coercion are relics of the past.  I just don’t see how we continue with that language in the 21st century.  I prefer to talk about the Weakness of God (1 Cor. 1:15)  [I have blogged about it here].  God’s power is a different sort of power. God is powerful but it is not a unilateral power. It is not a coercive power. It is a persuasive (more seductive) power. It works with our desires and it begins with what is.

This is why I want to speak in ways that reflect the way things are.

7

>Feedback on the Weakness of God

>Sometimes you have to start in the middle. So here is the definition of the weakness of God that we ‘ended’ up with.
Then we will go back to a few weeks ago when we were working it out.
We will end where we started (the middle) with this definition again
and then I will propose something new for the road ahead !

These are mostly emails conversations that I have gotten permission to use (that is why I changed the identity or location of the writer) the one’s at the end were comments on the website.

here is where we are now

ET
Hey! what about this:

What if every time I said “weakness’ , if I said (in parentheses)
“God’s inverted redefinition of Power we see in Christ – 1 Cor. 1:25)

would that help?

now we go back

Michigan
When I first read your blog my first reaction was to question where God was weak. Personally I don’t like the idea of a weak God, but I came to the conclusion that a being is weak or strong is like to our word for an abstract concept. As you know the Latin/Western world views something as strong only as long as it can conquer something else, creating dominance, and vis versa, the loser is weak. As I read through your paper I can to realize that we I might call strength is not as such. I asked myself if a great strength can be found in adhering to mercy. I think back to Aslan in the Lion, the Witch, and the wardrobe He gives his live for the safety of another. The Lion is taken is what seems to everyone as weakness, but it the action has an inherent strength. All that to say this: what is even though Caputo speak of God as “weak”, what westerns should do is rearrange our definition of strong and weak. If true strength is revealed through weakness then it is in fact strong. Thus if being strong is truly a form of a weak or cowardly mind then it is weak.

Therefore, in my own head, even though Caputo make a case for a weak God, the underlying tone is the God being called weak by western humanity is truly strong than we know. Thus a slight reversal in our names for abstract ideas can change our culture.

I loved the idea of theo-poetics, but I still have a hard time wrestling with Christ as an event of God. I still somewhat see this as a denying that Christ was incarnate. If you wouldn’t mind helping me with that, I would appreciate that. It seems that if Christ is an event of God than Jesus is just a human with a deep connection to God who is still distant, where the classical idea is the God was among us on Earth. I still prefer the later.

Louisiana
I do not have an opinion to share on the weakness of God. From some of the discussion I’ve heard, it sounds like the sticking point is the difference between God being weak, and God choosing to be weak. I would tend to list towards the latter opinion, but again, I haven’t read all of your thoughts on the subject yet.

My question would be, then, how is God redeeming this? Or, how is God trying to work through us to redeem this?

Institutional Christianity is increasingly becoming irrelevant in America; “We are in charge” may be doomed sooner rather than later. It’s mostly the crazy Christians that get TV air-time. I would say this is equivalent to reality TV: institutional Christianity in America is becoming a ridiculous side-show. So maybe you don’t have to be a cynic for too much longer. Maybe the over-the-top caricature of institutional Christianity that seems to get the most media attention is making room for us to provide an ever more striking contrast as an alternative.

Republic of Island
You know, I love the architecture of all the “churches” here, but they are giant imposing reminders of who’s (or who was) in charge.

There are boxes with family names in the older church buildings where the rich folks used to sit (chief seats). I know old folks who won’t go to church because they remember that when they were little, they had to sit in the back while the rich folks sat in front.

There are monuments in church buildings here that praise soldiers who died in service of God and (country) halfway across the world while trying to conquer a foreign people.

80% of our income goes out the door (to the denominational hierarchy). Some of it goes to pay for the upkeep of empty church buildings.

Our denomination has a “Redundant Buildings” Committee.

Here we are at the end of the empire, trying to figure out what’s important. It is an interesting time to be working (in this system).

North Dakota
“The cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to those who are being saved, it is the power of God”. For me, the cross really is powerful. Salvation is found in it, healing is found in it. In a profound feat of weakness, defeat, and quiet victory over sin and death, God’s power has been shown to us through the cross. “A bruised reed he did not break, and a flickering candle he did not snuff out”, but in the process, he provided salvation and healing to any and all who would call
on him. Because I am a real Christian, and am against the argument culture of denominationalism/Christian Sectism/Conservative/Liberalism, I REALLY DO THINK GOD IS STRONGER and MORE POWERFUL than anyone in the world. I do not think America is powerful. I think I just have an enlightened perspective:-) Take the way I spend my time: I spend the most amount of my time and energy on those who are on the fringe, annoying to other people, have mental disorders. I do that because I believe that “It’s not the healthy who need a doctor but the sick” and Jesus came to call “not the righteous, but the sinners to repentance”. I see the power of God in these conversations/discipleship scenarios. When I hear about a need from someone who will have no way to return the favor, I’m ALL OVER THAT most of the time because I believe that I’m supposed to not
invite those who can’t return the favor to the lavish banquet. I am with Jesus in weak ministry to the weak. I feel God’s presence in it, and in a twist, I see HIS POWER, and the POWER OF HIS CROSS. I just have such a different perspective on power than the world, that I really have come full circle to the point that I see Jesus and the cross as power, and talk-radio/voting/and politics as NOT-POWER. I do understand why you are hitting this thing hard.
I was so mad last week because I met with someone who is a very passionate follower of Christ. My one problem with them, was I was explaining how for us as followers of Jesus, I do not see how we can participate in any military machine. He said, “but in Ecclesiastes it says there is a time for war”. Yeah? Well, it also says there is a time to die. Let me ask you, was death part of God’s original plan? Why the hell did Jesus come anyway? Like you so rightly said it in your PODCAST, we did not learn the lessons from Jesus that we were supposed to, and now we are Spiritually retarded. I mean, if not to revise things, then why did Jesus come at all? Why did he die on the cross? So, I guess I am with you, and I understand your methods of communication. Because I feel the power of the cross in my life, and in the lives of the lowly and weak around me, I have an upside-down opinion on power.

What the heck do we do with the Bible and people’s mis-understanding of it? This is such a bad problem. People think that because something happened in the Old Testament, it’s fair game, and no one seems to understand what Jesus came and did. It seems that people see what GOD did in the Old Testament, then appoint themselves as ‘god’ in the New Covenant. “We can do what GOD did in the Old Testament!!!” No, Jesus modeled for us God’s desire for humanity. READ YOUR bible, and stop ‘cherry-picking’ from the Old Testament. YOU ARE NOT GOD (Romans 8:28-30). Jesus was the “firstborn” among many brothers. That means that everyone after him is supposed to be like him, NOT like GOD in the Old Testament examples, or even like Old Testament
peoples. Please leave being GOD to GOD. Right? Jesus is the firstborn, we are his offspring. We are to “Walk as Jesus did”.

Now that I understand that you are “hitting this thing hard” and that you DO consider Jesus’ healing and such to be powerful, I feel fine. It just seemed like when people asked you about the healing of Jesus, or salvation, or any other displays of power, you defaulted to “God isn’t able to help, God is weak” without explaining his healing and salvation fit. You were trying to keep people from defaulting to Caesar-like America-like power. I get it. For me, it seemed like you were avoiding questions that might challenge your thesis, which I felt was lame. I don’t think so anymore. I see what you’re doing, and I’m cool with it. I think we are actually in agreement about this stuff. The more I consider it and think about it, and read the Scriptures, the more I know what you are saying. The real question is, what is God’s nature? What is God like? We see all the way through the Old Testament God appointing Prophets and Patriarchs to accomplish His will (which didn’t go well, and He didn’t interfere for the most part), then in the New Testament, persecution, the cross, a virtually invisible resurrection from the dead and ascension, then a persecuted, murdered, minority Church to spread the Gospel. You are right that we should heed these stories of what God has done in order to see what God is like in His Nature. One interesting story of Annanias and Saphira (sp?). God put them to death for deceiving, and claiming to give all, but only giving some. Is that God’s holiness or what? Some would read that story and say God was choosing a display of power to make a point about not doing “unholy things” in the presence of “holy God”. Maybe it was just unavoidable because of God’s nature. Whatever. Random thoughts.

I agree with you that God is weak, in that His power is not coercive or dominating. I was just confused by your insistence that he is weak without comment on his power in healing and salvation. I’m still thinking about the idea that God can’t do anything unless through us. Us good protestants say that Jesus is the only way to God, and so we are in essence saying, “God needed a body” to accomplish salvation, even His own body. Interesting stuff, and interesting thought. I know that practically, I live my life like this is true. Even when God does provide for his people, it is through angels, and actions on the part of his people. This does seem to be how God is, what He’s like, and how he carries out his will. Anyway, I get ya that POWER as defined by you is the worlds power of domination and coercion. I was just missing the talk about the power I feel is in the cross. See above for my writing on that.

Delaware
I find the conversation here at Everyday Theology very helpful and incredibly interesting. Before I ask my questions though, let me say, as gently as possible: God is not the author of death. He is not sending anyone a message through the earthquake in Haiti. If there is a spiritual component to this horrible event it originated in Hell, not Heaven. Don’t worry, the Pat Robertsons of the world will continue to marginalize themselves by saying anti-Christian things like his latest, until no one is listening to him anymore.

I do however have a couple of unresolved questions. ET says that this disaster was caused by shifting tectonic plates and unresolved poverty. Yes, this is the vehicle through which death was delivered. But I do believe that there is a spiritual component to this event. I am not sure what it is, but I suspect it has something to do with Satan’s desire to kill, steal and destroy and my failure as a follower of Jesus to bring redemption to the people of Haiti. Is there a spiritual component to this disaster?

Second question: While Jesus displayed a glaring lack of human power he did display an incredible amount of heaven’s power (healing sick, feeding the hungry, raising the dead and so forth). While the weakness of Jesus has got me thinking about what the Gospel really is and how it is totally and utterly opposed to empire, I still see a power offered to his disciples that inserted the impossible into human tragedy. Where does this authority over sickness and death fit in this emerging theology?

ET
Wow. you have quickly gotten to the heart of the matter. I really like what you said in your first paragraph. Powerful statements.

First question: I can only tell you what I think. I think that the tectonic plates are ‘natural’ in origin. I think that the systemic poverty is ‘human’ in origin. and I think that IF there is anything ‘spiritual’ that it is people’s response to tragedy and hurt. Christ’s body reaching out, holding the hurting, healing wounds and reaching into the wound.

second question – this is a tough one. I want to believe. I do not want to be a cynic. If we have the power to raise people from the dead and heal the sick, why are we not flying ‘miracle teams’ over there to raise the dead and heal the sick? IF EVER we were going to step up into an ACTS like authority and take ‘dominion’ (as someone else has said) then THIS would certainly be the time do that!! The world is watching – it would be publicized on GLOBAL TV. The world would SEE and BELIEVE.

please understand me. I have seen miracles. I believe. I just don’t know that it is predictable enough to ‘go public’ with it. I think that we 1) show up 2) love without condition or judgment 3) serve 4) pray and see what happens. That really is the best I have right now. I mean, if you feel called to get on an airplane and fly down … or better yet – just pray from where you are that the dead in Haiti will get up and start to tell of God and his power, you can do that right now.

I am just saying that I do not think that is that way it works. I think that God is weak. I think that God loves weakness. I think that God works in our weakness. That is why I think we go (in weakness) and serve (in our weakness) and embrace others weakness and that is how God is made manifest, in our weakness.

Ike in Bosnia
Hello Everyday,

Wow, lots of good stuff to chew on.

I’m still do not agree that if we say to the people of Haiti, “God is weak” that that is somehow a more palatable, 21st-century message. Likewise, if we say, “Good news Haiti, God is in control” I don’t believe that it is outdated, nor that it is proven wrong by present facts and reality.

We do have to wrestle with pain and death in this world. We can make the world a better place but we cannot make it a perfect place without pain and death. And there is a reason for that. God is in the process of redemption but has not completed it yet.

Why is it that when human suffering was commonplace and taken for granted it was OK to say that God is almighty. Now, however, we can’t say that because it doesn’t fit our context?

You once indirectly criticized a preacher for refusing to believe in a Jesus who could be beat up. That concept of Jesus just didn’t fit with what he decided was right or proper. But at the same time I’m hearing that we cannot believe in a strong God because it doesn’t fit 21 century concepts of what is real or works or is proper?

When did we, the citizens of the 21st century, decide how God should be? And when did God say, “Oh, you’re right. I have to change myself to fit your your conceptions of me?”

I think one amazing point of the incarnation, the manger and the cross is that God did things his way in a manner that didn’t fit the preconceived notions of the day.

Then by the resurrection God showed strength in the midst of weakness. God will do the same in our weakness. As we are weak, God is strong and proves that God is faithful to those who have that trust.

At some point we must all wrestle with the true God, as is. I am created, God is creator. Somehow I feel we are getting this backwards.

ET
Ike – You know how much I like you! And how much your contribution here means to me. So I am not saying this to you per se but just throwing it ‘out there’.

When we say that “God is in control” what does that mean? To the people of Haiti does that mean anything? In the Balkan Wars when Catholic Croats, Serbian Orthodox Christians and Bosnian Muslims were raping and killing each other… in what way was God in control?

I am not sure that God is in control. I am growing to believe that God is a weak.

The first objection someone makes is to say ‘ God isn’t weak, in the Old Testament…” but that raises a whole new set of questions.

-Is that God dead? I mean, why doesn’t that stuff happen now?
– If he’s that strong and he doesn’t do anything, maybe he doesn’t care. I mean if you’re telling me that he’s strong then maybe he’s not as loving as we’ve been told.
– Is it possible that the ancient Hebrews were mistaken and YHWH isn’t the King of Heaven (God most High) like they thought and was, in actuality, a regional Deity and we have outgrown his power?

Maybe it would be best if people didn’t just tell me how ancient societies conceived of their God. I am asking a real question: what if God is weak? What if the explanation of the evil in the world isn’t Theodicy or Sovereignty or any of the constructs of the past? Maybe we have conceived of God wrongly and God isn’t who we were told he was. If Jesus is God ( which is what I believe) then maybe HE should be a lens by which we can evaluate what happens in history.

The difference between me and the bully preacher from Seattle is that I am not saying that if God isn’t who I thought he was that I won’t worship him. What I am saying is that maybe God has shown who he is and we have chosen to stick with a previously conceived notion that is far more fantasy and façade than revelation.

What ever God turns out to be, I will worship. I’m not telling God who God has to be. I am asking what if God isn’t who we told that God was.
I am looking at who God has revealed God’s self to be in Christ and in history — and I’m wondering if God is really weak and it is WE who will not accept that.

ET
Hey! what about this:

What if every time I said “weakness’ , if I said (in parentheses)
“God’s inverted redefinition of Power we see in Christ – 1 Cor. 1:25)

would that help?

that is where we find ourself in this conversation

Here is something to power us on the road ahead:

I am presenting the New Testament as a “poetics” of the kingdom of God, a theo-poetics — as opposed to a “theo-logic”, an ethics, or a church dogmatics — as a complex of narratives, parables, and paradoxes of which Jesus is the centerpiece. From a work such as that cannot simply and straightforwardly “derived” a course of action. We need instead to “arrive” at an instantiation, a concretization, a way to translate it into existence, all the while letting it happen (arriver) to us, allowing ourselves to come under its spell and be transformed by the event it harbors. For that we require a delicate style of interpretation, a “hermeneutics”…
– John Caputo

0

>Is God Weak or Strong ?

>Is God strong or weak?
People generally seem to think that if there is a God then that being is very ‘God like’ and encapsulates all of the things we generally hope and assume that God is. “My God is so Big so strong and so mighty – there’s nothing my God can not do” seems to be the predominant thought on this. Most people, I think, are under the impression that God is strong. So I am not going to spend a lot of time on that. I think that people know that construct well.

I want to put forward a different theory. I believe that God is weak, that God works weakly and that we have to partner with that God in order for it work.
Here is my theory in the form of a word picture (Someday I will make it into a narrative or parable): it’s as if God broadcasts a signal weakly into the world. Picture a radio tower sending signals out into the surrounding area. There are three conditions or scenarios involved in this.

We have the right ‘equipment’ and often we have to learn to dial it in. You have be tuned into the right signal. This is often made easier by being around somebody who it ‘tuned’ in – or for that matter, who is not just receiving but relaying the signal ( a reflecting dish that radiates the signal)

The second component is that the signal is faint enough that some people don’t think that the signal even exists and others explain away or attribute it to something else. The signal is weak enough that some people don’t even think that there is a signal.

The third is that the signal is weak enough that you also have turn down other competing signals and sources of noise, in order to really tune in. Even those who want to tune in, often have to tune out competing signals or technologies.

Now I know that this is a radically new concept to some and it does not get the best reaction at first. People often want to quote passages from the Old Testament in order to reinforce the conception that God is strong. But I sort of feel like saying “You have heard it said that God is strong, but I tell you that what we see in Jesus is weak”

Two passages of scripture here just to think about how God works :
1 Corinthians 1: 22 Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles…For the foolishness of God is wiser than man’s wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength.
Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. 28He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him.

2 Corinthians 12:9 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me

I think that Jesus is the best gift that humanity has ever received- better than life itself for this gift transcends life. What we see in Christ is the ‘Weakness of God’ (as John Caputo calls it) and it is counter to everything that this world upholds a praiseworthy and worthy of glory.

When most people talk to me about God it seems as if they are describing Zeus from Mt. Olympus, Thor from Valhalla, Ra of Egypt, Baal of the Cannanites, Dagon of the Assyrians, or Apsu and Tiamat of the Babylonians. When people talk to me about God I rarely hear them talk of the manger, the foot washing model of servant leadership, the shame of the cross, the questions around the resurrection or the small crowd of the ascension. All these are understated, off the beaten path, out of the spotlight … weak.

It’s almost as if we have the ancient ways that people talked about God, like Zeus. Then (as it appears chronologically to us) God revealed the fullest expression of the divine nature in Christ. We love what Jesus did for us. Then we went on talking about God in Caesar terms. Almost as if Jesus is a hiatus of weakness from the regularly scheduled program of Zeus and Caesar – sandwiched between the two.

Just think about the incarnation – the humility of the birth story.
Think about the foot-washing at the last supper.
Think about the non-violent response to the arrest.
Think about the cross.
Think about the events surrounding the resurrection (on this side of the stone) and how understated and gentle it was.
Think about Pentecost – this powerful redistribution of God’s spirit – and how it was interpreted as something else.

I think that this is how God works and I think that this is how God is.

Just to be clear: I do not believe that God is really strong and just pretending to weak (self limitation) and I am not playing semantics by redefining ‘strong’ as ‘weak’ in a theological flip-a-roosky or switch-a-roosky. (those are official Theological terms by the way and even if the weren’t real, they ARE actual things that I have been accused of).

I actually think that God is weak. It explains so much. It explains why He didn’t stop the atrocities of the Second World War (or any war for that matter). It explains why rape and child abuse are allowed to go on. It’s not that god, who is said to be ‘all knowing’, knows and doesn’t care. It is that God is weak. God is not outside of time watching things unfold and picking and choosing which situations to intervene in. God is here with us – in the moment – and God works through us. That is the weakness.

Sure, people long ago conceived of God in Kingly way. The Scholastic Theologians of church history had to answer the question ‘If God is all Powerful and God is all Loving, then how can He abide evil.’ The problem is called Theodicy, but it is predicated on the assumption that God is all Powerful (omnipotent).

I think that it is a conversation worth having and a concept worth revisiting. I am willing to redefine it but I know that others are quite apprehensive about making any changes to the old formula.

The truth is that I am really nervous. I am nervous that when people talk about God they are really talking about expectations of Caesar. That modern christianity is far more Rome than christ, far more Empire than kingdom.

I know that people react to the notion that is God is weak. We want a God who is strong. But I fear that what we really want is a Caesar, Zeus, Thor, Ra and not a Christ at all.

If you want to read a paper on John Caputo’s ‘The Weakness of God’ [HERE]

I will close with a quote from that.

“ The kingdom of God is the rule of weak forces like patience and forgiveness, which, instead of forcibly exacting payment for an offense, release and let go. The kingdom is found whenever war and aggression are met with an offer of peace. The kingdom is a way of living, not in eternity, but in time, a way of living without why, living for the day, like the lilies of the field – figures of weak forces – as opposed to mastering and programming time, calculating the future, containing and managing risk. The kingdom reigns wherever the least and most undesirable are favored while the best and most powerful are put on the defensive. The powerless power of the kingdom prevails whenever the one is preferred to the ninety-nine, whenever one loves one’s enemies and hates one’s father and mother while the world, which believes in power, counsels us to fend off our enemies and keep the circle of kin and kind, of family and friends, fortified and tightly drawn.”

P.S. A great book to read is “What would Jesus deconstruct” which is Caputo’s interaction with “In His Steps” by Charles Sheldon.

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>God isn’t who we thought

>God isn’t who we thought- 3 problems with the Big 5 God:

1.When we make God too big and too pure and too heavenly – the Incarnation becomes impossible. It just doesn’t make sense how God could have bridged that gap. Maybe it’s not that we’ve made good too big but that we have over emphasized the gap between Spirit & Matter, Heaven and Earth, God & the Creation.

2.If that God is all powerful then he is not all loving. And if he is all loving then he is not all powerful – and no amount talk bout ‘mystery’ or ‘tension’ is going to cut it. Sunday school answers about just ‘trusting that He knows what is best’ don’t work in the face of the atrocities that we saw in the 20th century. Either we outgrew that god, or he died or he isn’t who we thought he was.

3.Even if we do believe in that old concept of God (and keep in mind – I am not talking bout the God of the Bible. I am talking about the God that emerged in the first three centuries around Christ and continued to evolve throughout church history). If we do stick with that God then we have to address the the obvious question: where did he go? He hasn’t done much in a while. Maybe after Jesus and the writing of the Bible his work was done and now it is up to us to figure it out. Maybe technology, education and civilization steal his powers and he can only work where those things are not.

Now of course – and I hope that this is obvious – I don’t believe that. I believe in God and God’s present work in the world. But this concept of God is incoherent and irrational as well as impractical in the modern world. I don’t mind taking things by faith. I am a person of faith. But I am not going to use the ‘Faith’ card on something that is nothing more that a poorly conceived construct.

The thing that I want tell you, in the way of good news, is that Deconstruction is not Destruction or Demolition. It is simple admitting that we need a new model and getting about the business at hand.

And I think that maybe a good place to start is making sure that the one we call ‘God’ is that one that Jesus called ‘Abba’.

Next time… we go for it: let’s just have it out and tackle the question – is God strong or weak? and then we get on with it.

OK – so there it is in the new format. Short and sweet. I jammed it into a couple of short paragraphs!

If you want to stick around for Overtime -I will unpack it a little bit and flesh it out. But there you have the seed here and the framework.
___________________________

Overtime: the old style big Essay (or just go to post a comment at the bottom)

I know that it is a new year so I hate to start it with a negative but I have some unfinished business from the past year. So…

I want to start this year with a confession.
I don’t believe in this configuration of God: Omni-potent, Omni-present, Omniscient, Impassable, Immovable.
It doesn’t matter whether you call him the God of the Creeds, the God of Church History, the God of Orthodoxy or of ‘Classic Christianity’. It’s just not who I pray to, who I sing about or who I participate with… not when it’s configured like that.
And here is why. Here are my 3 big problems with the Big 5 God.

The Incarnation becomes an Impossibility.
When we focus too much on God’s transcendence, try to make God too big and too ‘Other’ we paint ourselves into a corner and it actually become logistically impossible for Jesus to have come in the flesh! When we talk about God in too grandiose terms we often borrow for Gnostic language and say that ‘God can nothing to do with this sinful world’ and then someone says ‘what about jesus ? If he was fully God and fully man, how did he bridge this massive gap that you have set up?’ And the answer that is given rings hollow. “It is a Mystery.” Now listen , I am ALL about mystery and the mystical and the supernatural… but I object to using ‘mystery’ to defend our illogical and incongruent conceptions of God.

Which brings me to my second point…

Theodicy – “a response to the problem of evil in the world that attempts logically, relevantly and consistently to defend God as simultaneously omnipotent, all loving and just despite the reality of evil.”
In the past this has been a real problem. If God is all powerful and God is loving and he’s just then why is he evil allowed to persist? And this IS a real problem. I just have two quick thoughts about this:
The 20th century was brutal for God. Not only did he take a beating in the classroom (and sometimes in the courtroom) but he was often nowhere to be found outside of evangelical and Pentecostal worship services. But in a very real sense we saw a what evils people were capable of in the name of God. In movements like the the Nazis of Germany, the Khmer Rouge of Cambodia, the conflicts in the former Yugoslavia ( Bosnia, Serbia and Croatia) and the god-soaked language of African atrocities in Darfure a(not to mention the cults of Jonestown and the Brach Davidians among countless others) we saw little difference from the godless regimes of Communist Russia, the Fascist, the Totalitarians and the Utopians. God was seemed to make little difference is how we treated enemies, combatants
We have much better ways to think about this now! Ya know – we are not limited to the way is that they thought about God in the second and third centuries. We are not limited to the constructs of the plagues any crusades of the 1100’s. we aren’t not limited to the constraints in thought of the 16th and 17th century. This is a new day. And there are much better options now for thinking about how the universe is constructed and how reality functions, how history progresses and where humanity participates.

Theodicy is a problem of constructs and conceptions of the past. when you beef God up too much and over-inflate your portrayal of your conception, you have to come back and defendant at construct when things don’t go well. We have concepts and frameworks now that incorporate the evils of things like the second world war and the atrocities of the 20th century into a working configuration that integrates the presence of evil with the way of the world actually works and the belief in a loving God. We are not limited by the way people have thought about and talked about God in the past. There is a progressive, emerging, innovative and thoughtful way to approach this.

The old God is nowhere to be found.
This is perhaps my biggest problem with the old big 5 God. He hasn’t done anything in a while. Either he did some really cool stuff in the Bible and then he retired, or he is a regional deity that can do cool things with the weather and some miraculous things in a very small locations with small groups of people.
People who voraciously defend the literalness of the Bible run into a problem if they do not have those kind of experiences to detail of biblical proportion. If you want to say that the kind of things that we read about in the Bible literally happen, that’s fine. But there had better be a self validating expression and experience that coincides with it. It does no one any good to have a passionate defense of the literalness of the biblical account if there are no self validating evidences in the community. Some people split history into dispensations and say well that was then and this is now, and that really happened then but it’s not going to happen now. So that’s kind of a dead-end. Apparently the big five God changed. After he did his big impressive stuff he retired into some recess of the universe — having written a bestseller with the Bible he had enough to live on for the rest of history. but these people usually come back and say “God never changes – he is the same yesterday today and forever” so that gets confusing. because while God never changes apparently his interaction with the world does. He doesn’t change but the times do. So the fact is hard to figure out.
Other people say that everything we read about in the book of acts is available to us today. But the really awkward question quickly surfaces. Why do so many of this god’s miracles seem to happen in places of poverty, no electricity and little education. Is it that he prefers these out-of-the-way places where people haven’t figured out not to believe in God yet or is it that way electricity & education show up his power diminishes.

I’m not trying to be a jerk here. I believe in God. I believe in the miraculous. I believe in Jesus and the Gospel of grace. I am a believer. What I am saying is that our conceptions of God from the third century the 11th century and the 16th century may not work for us in the modern era. We live in “ a world come of age” and our conception of God has to grow up too. we live in a world that is progressing and changing and evolving into something that it has never been before. Our faith has the capacity to speak to, interact with and to learn from that world in a way that is mutually edifying and empowering. But that will not happen if we insist on remaining and reinforcing these constructs and conceptions of God of centuries past.

Here’s my bottom line: it hasn’t worked to bring about either the world we hope for or the one that we promised in our message. We have, up with lots of ways to explain it away – most of these focus on human sinfulness,the fallenness of mankind or the work of the devil.

The only thing that I can tell you in the way of good news is that Deconstruction is not Destruction or Demolition. It is simple admitting that we need a new model and getting about the business at hand.

And I think that maybe a good place to start is making sure that the one we call ‘God’ is that one that Jesus called ‘Abba’.

OK – I just needed to get that off my chest. and now I can move on and get down to the task at hand!!

Next time we go for it: let’s just have it out and tackle the question – is God strong or weak? and then we get on with it.

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>God’s Weakness in Haiti

>This is a conversation that I was having at the Website with Dan

Dan:
I find the conversation here at Everyday Theology very helpful and incredibly interesting.  Before I ask my questions though, let me say, as gently as possible:  God is not the author of death.  He is not sending anyone a message through the earthquake in Haiti.  If there is a spiritual component to this horrible event it originated in Hell, not Heaven.  Don’t worry, the Pat Robertson’s of the world will continue to marginalize themselves by saying anti-Christian things like his latest, until no one is listening to him anymore.

I do however have a couple of unresolved questions.  ET says that this disaster was caused by shifting tectonic plates and unresolved poverty.  Yes, this is the vehicle through which death was delivered.  But I do believe that there is a spiritual component to this event.  I am not sure what it is, but I suspect it has something to do with Satan’s desire to kill, steal and destroy and my failure as a follower of Jesus to bring redemption to the people of Haiti.  Is there a spiritual component to this disaster?

Second question:  While Jesus displayed a glaring lack of human power he did display an incredible amount of heaven’s power (healing sick, feeding the hungry, raising the dead and so forth).  While the weakness of Jesus has got me thinking about what the Gospel really is and how it is totally and utterly opposed to empire, I still see a power offered to his disciples that inserted the impossible into human tragedy.  Where does this authority over sickness and death fit in this emerging theology?

Me: – wow. you have quickly gotten to the heart of the matter. I really like what you said in your first paragraph. Powerful statements.

First question: I can only tell you what I think. I think that the tectonic plates are ‘natural’ in origin. I think that the systemic poverty is ‘human’ in origin. and I think that IF there is anything ‘spiritual’ that it is people’s response to tragedy and hurt. Christ’s body reaching out, holding the hurting, healing wounds and reaching into the wound.

second question – this is a tough one. I want to believe. I do not want to be a cynic. If we have the power to raise people from the dead and heal the sick, why are we not flying ‘miracle teams’ over there to raise the dead and heal the sick? IF EVER we were going to step up into an ACTS like authority and take ‘dominion’ (as someone else has said) then THIS would certainly be the time do that!! The world is watching – it would be publicized on GLOBAL TV. The world would SEE and BELIEVE.

please understand me. I have seen miracles. I believe. I just don’t know that it is predictable enough to ‘go public’ with it. I think that we:
1) show up
2) love without condition or judgment
3) serve
4) pray and see what happens.
That really is the best I have right now. I mean, if you feel called to get on an airplane and fly down … or better yet – just pray from where you are that the dead in Haiti will get up and start to tell of God and his power, you can do that right now.

I am just saying that I do not think that is that way it works. I think that God is weak. I think that God loves weakness. I think that God works in our weakness. That is why I think we go (in weakness) and serve (in our weakness) and embrace others weakness and that is how God is made manifest, in our weakness.

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