Shack Part 2: the context of forgiveness

There are some, that despite the depths within my own soul that grace has touch, I think fall outside the bounds of forgiveness.

Gideon often incited a story from Phillip Yancey about a mother who would prostitute her two year old child to pay for her drug habit. He astutely shared the story in the context of Jonah thinking that perhaps God was offering too much grace in forgiving Nineveh of it’s horrors. I have two children now and the more I spend time with them the more valid responses like Jonah’s seem. That’s too much grace. I’d love if in these scenarios God would suspend the love/freedom project and magically lift this child from this situation and use one of Zeus’s lightning bolts to smite such a heinous sinner. God doesn’t and I wonder both why if the project is worth it.

What’s more it’s one thing for God to refrain from the lightning bolt, but quite another to work to rescue this one who we’ll identify as one of Manning’s ragamuffins. The ragamuffin it would seem is beyond repair and a waste of my rehab funding tax dollars. The ragamuffin should have her child taken away and put in prison where she would suffer and slow and horrible death in retribution.

The problem with our story is that we are a world full of ragamuffins even if we don’t want to admit it. Ever since great grandpa Adam ate fruit there seems to be this undeniable propensity within all of us to choose ragamuffin activity. Choice among our ragamuffin activity is our desire to judge. This is how I get away with calling down lightning bolts on our original ragamuffin. The ability to discern between good and evil, to see clearly that prostituting your child deserves hell. That’s where this raga would send that raga.

William Young’s gift to this conversation is his chapter on judgment. I frame the situation me vs the raga. He reminds me that from the perspective the divine it’s this child vs this child and consequently boldly asks Mack to play God by deciding not between the teaching pastor and the skank, but rather between one child and the other. Who to send to hell?

“I don’t want to be the judge,” he said, standing up. Mack’s mind was racing. This couldn’t be real. How could God ask him to choose among his own children? There was no way he could sentence Katie, or any of his other children, to an eternity in hell just because she had sinned against him. Even if Katie or Josh or Jon or Tyler committed some heinous crime, he still wouldn’t do it. He couldn’t! For him, it wasn’t about their performance; it was about this love for them.
‘I can’t do this,’ he said softly.
‘You must,’ she replied.
‘I can’t do this,’ he said louder and more vehemently.
‘You must,’ she said again, her voice softer.
‘I…will…not…do…this!’ Mack yelled, his blood boiling hot inside of him.
‘you must,’ she whispered.
‘I can’t. I can’t. I won’t!’ he screamed, and now the words and emotions came tumbling out. The woman just stood watching and waiting. Finally he looked at her, pleading with his eyes. ‘Could I go instead? If you need someone to torture for eternity, I’ll go in their place. Would that work? Could I do that?’ He fell at her feet, crying and begging now. ‘Please let me go for my children, please, I would be happy to…Please, I am begging you. Please…Please…”
“Mackenzie, Mackenzie,” she whispered, and her words came like a splash of cool water on a brutally hot day. Her hand gently touched his cheeks as she lifted him to his feet. Looking at her through blurring tears, he could see that her smile was radiant. ‘Now you sound like Jesus. You have judged well, Mackenzie. I am so proud of you!’”

162-3

Shack 1: Human Freedom

So the first time I really had to think about this was when I was in college in the thick of figuring out the differences between Calvinism, Arminianism and Open Theism. Naturally the question of human freedom comes to the forefront. I didn't quite understand what my reformed was asking or rather replying, but now I know his intent was to remind me how much more complicated human freedom is than just the principle of alternative possibilities or compatiblism.

As we listen to the sciences and other arenas of thought we discover more and more constraint. I don't think this means that we are automatrons nor does it mean that we enjoy the kind of omnipotence in ability that God does. We are constrained by hundreds perhaps even millions of factors every time we make a choice. Somewhere in the middle of all of this is human freedom.

this is my first a of a number of posts on William P. Young's The Shack. the following is an important paragraph that succinctly sheds light on this thought in a way I have not read elsewhere.

Mack is in a conversation about God and they stumble across this conversation. This is what God says about freedom.

"She paused only briefly and then turned back to her task, talking to him over her shoulder. 'Or, if you want to go just a we bit deeper, we could talk about the nature of freedom itself. Does freedom mean that you are allowed to do whatever you want to do? Or we could talk about all the limiting influences in your life that actively work against your freedom. Your family genetic heritage, your specific DNA, your metabolic uniqueness, the quantum stuff that is going on at a subatomic level where only I am the always-present observer. Or the intrusion of your soul's sickness that inhabits and binds you, or the social influences around you, or the habits that have created synaptic bonds and pathways in your brain. And then there's advertising, propaganda, and paradigms. Inside that consluence of multifaceted inhibitors,' she sighed, 'what is freedom really?'" (94-95)

it was the best of times and it was the worst of times

--- If you are here for one Lilli Carney, please see below ---



I’m trying to preserve the reverence I have for the moment. You only bring a child home for the first time a couple times in your life. There are few occurrences that could happen in the outside world which would consequently interrupt these couple of moments so much so that I feel compelled to write a blog post about it. We have one of those moments.

Maybe this will shed some light on the severity of the situation. About an hour after we got home today with Lilli, I went to run a few small errands. I called my best friend. My best man from my wedding. My brother after my biological brother. And did we talk about tar poop, lack of sleep, and cute cooing noises? No, and not because we are apathetic male jack asses. We did not because the more pressing issue, characterized by my friends comment, was this, “I feel like someone has ripped out my heart and sent it to New York.”

We didn’t trade a player. A family was not split up by divorce. One of our own was abducted and sold as a slave to the bourgeoisie of the elitist east coast. Brett Favre is more than the guy who broke records and delivered a super bowl trophy. He was the identity of a predominantly blue-collar state, that can’t tell you the starting line up of the Milwaukee Bucks and who also has dwindling hope that the Brewers might get to the playoffs, a place they haven’t been since the 82 World Series. Prince Fielder hit 50 home runs last year. No one will care next year. The Bucks took the 76ers to game 7 in the Eastern Conference finals in 2001. What happened to Glenn Robinson anyways? Brett Favre is the face of the Badger state. He is the pride of a state that otherwise is noted for cheese and beer.

This is what Ted Thompson did not understand. Fans might not come right out and admit it. But I have a suspicion that Packer fans might be more satisfied with a 3-13 Favre leading the Packers season than they would with a 13-3 Super Bowl appearance with Aaron Rogers behind center. And speaking of Aaron Rogers, nothing against him. In fact if there is one person I feel bad for it’s him. He’s been great through this whole thing. But this is why it is going to a difficult year for him no matter how well he performs. He’s not just filling in for a legend, more importantly, he’s filling in for the guy that you’d love to shoot the breeze about at the bar in March. He’s filling in for the guy Wisconsin business travelers are proud to acknowledge when they are traveling around the country. He’s filling in for the guy, whom families have been proud to name their children and pets after for the last 15 years.

My faith convictions teach me not wish bad for anyone, but if the Pack can’t win the superbowl I hope that Jets do and that Thompson and everyone else who backed his decision find themselves general managing some other organization as they ponder their mistake. This is not about winning and losing. This is business as usual. This is ripping out the heart of Wisconsin and sending it to New York.

Lillian Rae Carney (pics)

Lillian Rae Carney

time again

Sorry this blog has long been neglected. One more thought about the absurd nature of human freedom, atemporality and simultaneity. The area that this chiefly bothers me is in terms of it’s ramifications for soteriology. If it is true that God exists in every moment for all eternity, then is it not true that at the moment of creation, those who made their way down the narrow road and successfully joined God in the eschatological reign will simultaneously exist with God in this moment. This is where I appreciate the logical explanatory power of Calvinists. They are consistent on this point, but for all others, aside from OVT, the idea that God is above or outside time implicates not only God’s ontological ability to exists in these differing and competing moments of history, but also finite humans if they are really “with” God in these real moments.

In terms of soteriology this would seem to diminish human freedom in terms of LFW, or freedom defined by the PAP. The successive moments of history might appear or feel free, but if it is true that a being exists in a moment in the eschaton, then it must also be true that the moments of history which worked to solidify their post mortem position must also be fixed/acted up/chosen. Pick your term, but in any case agents do not seem free.

This also raises the question of the truthfulness of the now. If atemporality is a real option then one has to constantly ask where God’s real presence is?

Why Time Travel is Dumb…Or Why Desmond’s story fails….

So I mentioned a couple of weeks ago in sermon that Singleton’s gift to me was that he reminded me of God’s mysterious nature. If you listened closely you might have also heard me suggest that I never adopted his view of time either. I remain convinced that the tenet atemporality is meaningless.

For starters I think it is helpful to note that in so far as the metaphors that we know and in so far as the English language lets describe we know of two conversations that surround God and time. One linguistic and the other philosophical/phenomenological.

I often hear this in response to my presupposition that God exists with in the confines of time (said better…experiences duration with us). “Time is man’s invention,” and “God is above time because He created it.” This are both correct given some version of the creation story be it mythical/reality depicting for the hearer. The language about time, sun dials, our means of measuring seasons, the sun coming up and down, calendars, etc. are all in adoptions by man to explain the phenomenon of duration. Somehow I’m different and older than I was yesterday. However, just because I say it is 2:01 P.M. on June, 24 2008 means nothing ontologically for God. All this is man’s designation of increment to make his experience more coherent and logical. This is what I mean to suggest, in conceding that time is man’s invention. As a linguistic device that offers both explanatory power and coherence to our situation, “the time discussion” is fictional.

I also concede this and I’m no expert on string theory nor am I quantum physics…at the beginning of the big bang, in 1/10 of a millasecond, the ten or so dimension that they now posit “unrolled” (a metaphor) “began” or started to “begin”. As a result of this 4 dimensional phenomenological perception would now later be available to evolving humans some 10 trillion zillion years later (trillion zillion an exaggeration, what the Hebrew people might have used in the case of hyperbole (that was supposed to be funny)). This included the experiences of both change marked by time and/or duration.

Here I might be a bit evangelical, but as one who believes that God’s sovereignty includes his governance, preservation and concurrence…this big bang narrative and all it’s logical outworking would include the phenomenological perception of time. Hence I will concede that God invented time in this sense as well.

None the less. I reject God’s atemporality. First, this statement is meaningless. Even if it is true we can have no idea what it means because we have absolutely no frame of reference for it. This is the same as saying God is a;ldfkjasd. What this means we have no idea because it is made up. The best theological description would be a negative one. God’s relationship to time is “not like ours.” It is a description of something we have never experienced and have no data to even suggest of its ontological existence. In the same way our description of time is fictional our description of atemporality and the concept/word itself is fictional.

Secondly, and perhaps more importantly I read nothing in the Biblical narrative to suggest that God operates outside of time or even wants to be perceived that way. In almost every passage which is used to posit God’s timelessness the careful philosophical reader will notice timelessness, but rather God as eternally past and everlasting. Take three quick examples

Psalm 90

Lord, you have been our dwelling place
In all generations
Before the mountains were brought forth,
Or ever you had formed the earth and the world,
From everlasting to everlasting you are God.

You turns us back to dust,
And say, “Turn back, you mortals.”
For a thousand years in your sight
Are like yesterday when it is past,
Or like a watch in the night. ( Ps 90:1-4)

The only indication here is that God is from eternal past will exist into the future eternally. Nothing about God’s experience above our outside of time.

Takes it’s New Testament variant in 2 Pete 3:8. “with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like on day”

Time seems to be phenomenologically different for God, but God is never described as outside of it. I think what is meant here is something like this. Because God’s perspective includes his omnipotence and eschatological vision of the future time feels different or is experienced differently by God. In the same way I’ve heard people say that time flies the older they get. In reality time passes at the same increment/rate. Their experience of it changes.

Lastly, consider John 8:58 Jesus says, “Before Abraham was, I am.” By making this claim Jesus does the opposite of making a timeless claim. He, in taking Yahweh’s title places himself within time. In suggesting that he existed before Abraham, Jesus claims “sequence” a logical affirmation of one who experiences duration.

Perhaps in another post I could make the constructive case for God’s experiencing duration. Emotion, history, etc.

Now for Desmond.

Here is the nonsensical nature of all atemporal/time traveling proposals. Let’s be concrete and pick the moment when Desmond goes back in time to visit Penny in her apartment to both secure a promise from her to receive his phone call in 8 years and also to get a number that he could use in the future to contact her with. It’s ontologically true that this moment in history occurred once in Desmond’s past. It would be the first occurrence of December 24, 1996 for Desmond. In this narrative we’ll say Jack and Desmond had a beer and watched a game at the local pub instead of Desmond going to Penny’s house. Thus this storyline has a certain ontology to it. In addition to this, we have to believe that the epistemic experiences that shaped Desmond’s initial (jack at the bar on Dec. 24th) narrative remain intact even though he now has an alternative ontological past that also shapes his present epistemological demeanor. One might object that “no he lost all this when he past through the wrong coordinates,” but the writers failed because when he got back to the island he did not feel compelled to be reintroduced to everyone. There was a presupposition that this piece of his memory, a piece that belonged to his previous narrative was still in tact.

When he goes back in time he rewrites that piece of the script by not instantiating the actions of his original 1996 Dec. 24 experience, but rather by going to Penny’s. A change that would rewrite all that time in between so that Desmond could successfully place the call he did on Dec. 24 in 2004. But what about these competing story lines that exist in Desmond’s past? The same absurdity exists with his repeated saving of Charlie. Every time he prevents he eventually saw something that had no substantial ontology to it because it never occurred. One then has to ask, did Desmond really see correctly?

The more I think about what Abrams et all are doing I think they find their best expression through thinkers like Leibniz, Molina and contemporary figures such as Craig and Plantinga. It a sort of possible worlds/Molinism proposal. These are possible outcomes predicated on the choice of the characters. I guess the anomaly would be the ability of the competing narratives to collide in their ontological nature. For example. Locke is paralyzed in 2004 real time, but dragged back to 1996 (island time) and thus takes on physical characteristics of original 1996 body. This is odd to me. Why do people take on physical characteristics and not emotional and intellectual ones? Why is Claire still pregnant? Why doesn’t Walt behave like he is 1? Etc.

OK more on this as I think about it.

treasured

Romans 9 can be a hard chapter to read. God hating people! Yikes! It’s a chapter about election. Like people get picked for playground game for kickball. Some get picked early, some late and tragically some not at all. God turns out to be in the picking business.

I was reading up on some Ishmael/Isaac family quandaries today. Ishmael gets the divinely sanctioned boot because he wasn’t part of the divine plan. I’m crushed then I read this from the breathe of fresh air that is old testament scholarship… namely Walter Brueggemann.

The narrative holds us to the tension found so often in this narrative, the tension between the elected and the not-elected one who is treasured.

lost prediction #1

so I'm finally caught up with the rest of the world. I'd like to put forth my first prediction. The bird which Claire sends off th island (par avion) in 1996 with the message that "48 survivors from Oceanic 815," will be received sometime after 1996, but before 2005 when the rescuers are finally found. The finder will think the message is from a crazy person given the non-ontology of crash at this point in time. Eventually news will spread of the their return and trigger a memory the person who found the message. They will then spread the word about the message being found and Jack will figure out that the island was in fact in 1996, not 2004.

On smokie

official from the people that matter...taken from the loskpedia website on the smoke monster.


"On the official podcast posted on March 21, 2008, Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse confirmed that Yemi, the spider which bit and paralyzed Nikki, and some versions of Walt are manifestations of the Monster."

tagged

Six Random Things…this week or about me…tag I’m it.

Hmm…I needed something like this to get me out of my blog slump as well. I don’t know what it is, all the good ideas seem to be out there and not in here lately, but anyway here they are.

1. I met a guy from India today. He reminds me of everything that I might be missing in Christianity.

2. I’ve discovered that J.J. Abrams is a genius in the last couple of weeks and have become enamored with the best show on television…Lost.

3. I was asked by the most influential person I know personally today what I would communicate to culture about faith if I had significant media peeps at my disposal. I proposed an idea for a Flannery O’Conner short story that absolutely would be a great movie. I described the closing seen which I’ve had in my head for years now, as well as the cast of characters. This was fun for me.

4. Speaking of television, I’ve decided that if committed to reporting the mundane life of the average American family no one is doing it better than and more meaningfully than the writers of Brothers and Sisters.

5. I’ve had one of those months were the one thing you are thinking about confronts you almost every time you think about it and does so from unusual venues. This month it has been the human response in the face of violence.

6. I’m excited that some friends of ours our moving into the house next door.

I tag emily

Wait a minute!!!

"Something is bound to happen then?"

if I was smarter I would have done science

I've mentioned in a few sermons that I don't find most the arguments for the existence of God very compelling, especially those that utilize science or scientific principle, but I do find science itself incredible. Jamie told me about this stuff this morning in the office.

I usually don't post videos, but these were too great to pass up.

britt and holly on their way to hollywood

a couple of weeks ago, one katie duncan (media director of fletcher communications) asked us and the dukes to star in a commercial that a local car dealership was filming. We participated and I used my small stipend to buy a postmodern hoodie sweatshirt, not made in a sweatshop (see post below). Anyhow during desperate housewives last evening (4-13-08) Britt and Holly's thesbian skills were put on display for viewers all over the 254 area code viewing area . With the fantastic advances in technology, I (a Gandhi like consumer cycle laggard) was able to use my imovie feature along with my mac cam feature and tivo to record this off the tv. there is no sound, but you can check out Britt and Holly in action.

waco

I have had a lot of realizations over the last 7 or so months and I think it is because of this. For the first year in my life I’m not a student. This is significant for me because I’m someone who greatly appreciates change. That was the one nice thing about school. Every few months life hit the reset button. Now my weeks are indicative of my life. This is what I’m doing. No more putting things off until the next phase.

So I’ve done a few small things like try and work in a few days of exercise because I figure if I don’t do it right away I may never do it. I do it because this is my life and I want part of my story to be that I took care of my body. One of the things I’ve had to do is ante up to the fact that I really live in Waco. Not the pristine lakes of the Northern Wisconsin where I grew up. I live in Waco, TX. I’ve resolved to try and love this town and I’m finding more and more reason.

This last couple of weeks I’ve discovered a few gems. For those of you haven’t made it, the new Café Cappuccino is off the rocker great. Their lunch is less than stellar, but there breakfast and more specifically their banana pecan pancakes are fantastic. The real surprise is not how great their food is though, but rather that the ambiance is so magnificent. If everything else that developed down town would mimic the ethos of the CC, Waco would quickly begin to rival some other great cities…I’d name those cities, but their committed groupies would get fanatical and defensive.

The other that I’ll share about quickly is the new Bangkok Royal. They were the best Asian food joint before, but their new location is great and the inside is well decorated. The food we had was incredible. Their spring rolls are the best, one of my favorite things to eat in Waco. So check out these places if you are feeling depressed about living here.

music sunday

if you weren't in church sunday then you missed jillian who played daydream and
hosea. I'm picky about my music, but those were both phenomenal. they are rough recordings, but still good.

sweatshops

I’m looking for my social justice friends to help me out here. I’ve been in the market for a new hoodie for a couple of weeks. Evaluating why I buy the clothes that I do, I’ve been a bit more selective in my shopping. If I find a sweatshirt I like, the first thing I do is look at the tag. I usually see that the sweatshirt has been made in somewhere like China, Bangladesh, etc and consequently hang it back up. Why? I’m not entirely sure other than I just assume it was made by some kid in a sweatshop.

Ben informs me that sometimes it has more to do with the brand than it does with the place that it comes from. So I guess I need to find a list of textile producers that are part of winning team. So here is my real question. Are sweatshops bad? I’m told that Jeffrey Sachs says in his book on poverty that, in some cases, not purchasing items from some sweatshops will only make the situation worse. And that certain sweatshops, be they imperfect do give women (in particular) chances that they would not otherwise have.

But let’s just say that sweatshops are bad like the one I wrote about on May 21, 2007 (if you care to look in the archives). Is the logic that by me not purchasing the item from them, that they will go out of business? My follow up question then is this? Why are the sweatshop workers working there? It strikes me that if they are working there then they would rather be doing so than not doing so.

Now I know that the logic of some is…”don’t buy from the sweatshop because then we will force the sweatshops to increase the average wage paid to sweatshop workers” I guess I would just like to know if this is working or has worked. Does anyone have a success story they can point me to?

one year old and counting

My son is a year old. Not a one “years” old as my wife repeatedly reminds me. I want to write something significant about how my life has changed over the course of the last year. I’ll come at from a peculiar angle. I was reading a blog this evening and a certain theologian, whose name I’ll leave anonomous, because his groupies tend to track every time his name is written in digital form and write an absolutely uncreative dissertation type theological canned response to anyone who disagrees with him…and I don’t want that. Anyhow, a particular someone picked on this particular theologian and one of his groupies did the anticipated responding.

It reminded me of a past life I had. The one where my ambition to do Ph.D. work was bore out of. One that was both invigorating and yet often full of dissolution. One that is full of incredibly intelligent people who do a lot of work that effects the few who are exactly like them.

I had a coversation with Gideon at the Crowder/Claiborne concert. We talked a lot about what we read etc. and I noted his comment that he distances himself from the academic and emergent worlds not because of any particular dislike, but rather because neither seem to do much to really help people.

I do think correct theological tenets are important, but to be honest I think often the pursuit and sparring that goes on to get to these tenets leave people hurt and confused and does little to help starving children in Africa or broken marriages in America.

I think my son has helped bring this change about in me. That is one way in which my world is a lot different this year. I spend less time thinking about penal substitution and subjective atonement theories and less time about exhaustive definite futures and human freedom and more about how crazy it is that God loves humans more than and more perfectly than I love my son.

Thanks Roy

Lillian Rae Carney

an hour till the madness begins

In about one hour they will announce the pool of 64. I predict you will see Memphis, UCLA, Carolina and Kansas emerge as the one seeds pending a Kansas victory. It has been a good championship week for me. Of my four teams only one (Wisconsin) looks to claim a conference tourney title. They are up by 18 with four minutes to go. I'd love to see the badgers make some noise and win the whole deal, but I'm not sure they or anyone in the Big Ten has the depth to do it. I'm hoping by some miracle Baylor makes it in, but with a loss to a slumping Colorado team in the first round of the big 12 tourney things are looking bleak for the bears.