Christ-centered or God-centered. CWM is devoted to the adoration of God, to praise Him. As a matter of fact, CWM is youth music. Young people have the reputation of being self-preoccupied and self-indulgent, and certainly those traits have often appeared in the history of Christian youth music. However, they had learned to praise!
Scripturality. CWM is also, for most part, scriptural, and strikingly so. It is not necessary to reproduce the biblical phrases and cadences, but as an application of God’s Word, not a mere repetition of it. It is therefore legitimate for song in worship to use words, phrasing, and cadences different from those of Scripture itself. CWM does not, certainly, in itself give sufficiently broad coverage to sustain all aspects of evangelical worship over many years. The use of both CWM and traditional hymns are advisable.
Freshness and Communication. CWM has a contemporary, fresh feel to it. And most everybody grants that freshness is something good. These songs tend to communicate especially vividly with young Christians and un-churched visitors, and, communication to those groups is biblically important. There should also be concerted efforts to challenge mature believers, and CWM is less useful for that purpose, though not entirely irrelevant as we have seen.
Reference:
John M. Frame, Contemporary Worship Music: A Biblical Defense. Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R Publishing, 1997, p. 30-42.
Jumat, 15 April 2011
Senin, 11 April 2011
Pendapat Kaum Liberal mengenai Homosex
"These arguments among intellectuals--whether art critics or political philosophers or, say, research scientists--treat homosexuality more polemically than it deserves and, under the guise of being socially progressive, go a long way in darkening our already benighted, though deeply believed, sexual thinking. In the end, such "liberated" views continue to imprison desire in the dark cells of "gay" and "straight," rather than freeing our hearts and genitals to the fullest expression of human affection, which ought to be the unabashed ideal of any sexual liberation movement."
Darell Yates Rist, "Are Homosexuals Born that Way?" as quoted from Homosexuality : debating the issues / edited by Robert M. Baird & M. Katherine Baird. Amherst, N.Y. : Prometheus Books, 1995. p. 71-72.
"My dream was that you slept with people you liked and would not know about their sex until you undressed them." Nan Goldin in Mother Jones as written by Darell Yates Rist, "Are Homosexuals Born that Way?" as quoted from Homosexuality : debating the issues / edited by Robert M. Baird & M. Katherine Baird. Amherst, N.Y. : Prometheus Books, 1995. p. 71-72.
"I'am personally for the right of happy heterrosexuals to "experiment" with same-sex love and perhaps find that they like it. I'm for the right of bisexuals to opt for gay relationships, even though they dont have the excuse that they have no other choice. And I'm for the right of gay people to choose to act on their sexuality, whether society approves of it or not." Lindsy Van Gelder, The "Born That Way" Trap, as quoted from Homosexuality : debating the issues / edited by Robert M. Baird & M. Katherine Baird. Amherst, N.Y. : Prometheus Books, 1995. p. 82.
Darell Yates Rist, "Are Homosexuals Born that Way?" as quoted from Homosexuality : debating the issues / edited by Robert M. Baird & M. Katherine Baird. Amherst, N.Y. : Prometheus Books, 1995. p. 71-72.
"My dream was that you slept with people you liked and would not know about their sex until you undressed them." Nan Goldin in Mother Jones as written by Darell Yates Rist, "Are Homosexuals Born that Way?" as quoted from Homosexuality : debating the issues / edited by Robert M. Baird & M. Katherine Baird. Amherst, N.Y. : Prometheus Books, 1995. p. 71-72.
"I'am personally for the right of happy heterrosexuals to "experiment" with same-sex love and perhaps find that they like it. I'm for the right of bisexuals to opt for gay relationships, even though they dont have the excuse that they have no other choice. And I'm for the right of gay people to choose to act on their sexuality, whether society approves of it or not." Lindsy Van Gelder, The "Born That Way" Trap, as quoted from Homosexuality : debating the issues / edited by Robert M. Baird & M. Katherine Baird. Amherst, N.Y. : Prometheus Books, 1995. p. 82.
Finish Your Sermon Strong: 10 Mistakes To Avoid
Finishing a sermon is neither easy nor natural. There are plenty of ways to crash a good sermon; I’d like to offer a few I’ve observed in myself and others.
1. The “Searching for a Runway” Conclusion — This is a common one that we fall into when we fail to plan our conclusion before starting to preach. As the sermon wears on, we become aware of the need to land the plane but have to search for a decent runway on which to land it. Consequently, as we’re coming in to land, we remember that we haven’t reinforced a certain element of the message, so we pull out of the descent and circle around for another attempt. Next time in, we think of half of a conclusion that might work better and so pull out again, circle around, and turn in to another possible landing strip. Needless to say, passengers don’t find this pursuit of a better runway to be particularly comfortable or helpful. When the message drags on a couple of minutes (or ten) longer than it feels like it should, any good done in the sermon tends to be undone rather quickly!
2. The “Just Stop” Conclusion — There are some preachers who don’t seem to be aware of the possibility of a strong finish and so don’t bother to land the plane. It simply drops out of the sky at a certain point. Once all has been said, without any particular effort to conclude the message, it's suddenly over. This is a particular danger for those who go on to announce a closing hymn, I find.
3. The “Overly Climactic” Conclusion — At the other extreme are those who know the potential of a good finale and so overly ramp up the climactic crescendo in the closing stages. After preaching a ho-hum message, they suddenly try to close it off with a fireworks display that will leave everyone stunned and standing open-mouthed with barely an “ooo-aaah” on their lips. Truth is that if the message hasn’t laid the foundation for such an ending, then people will be left stunned and unsure of what to say: “Uuuugh?”
4. The “Uncomfortable Fade” Conclusion — Perhaps the domain of new, inexperienced, and untrained preachers, this follows the general comfort rule of preaching: If you are not comfortable in your preaching, your listeners won’t be either. So the message comes to what might be a decent ending, then the speaker, well, sort of, just adds something like, “That’s all I wanted to say, I think, yeah, so…” (like this paragraph, 20 words too long!)
5. The “Discouraging Finale” Conclusion — Another tendency among some is to preach what might be a generally encouraging message but then undo that encouragement with a final discouraging comment. People need to be left encouraged to respond to the Word and to apply the Word, but some have a peculiar knack for finishing with a motivational fizzle comment.
6. The “Machine Gun” Finish — Wildly fire off a hundred different applications in the final minute in the hope of hitting something—no depth, very shallow, badly aimed, rarely hits the target, and often has nothing to do with the passage.
7. The “Salvation by Works” Finish — After preaching the wonders of God’s grace in Jesus Christ, undermine that grace by throwing doubt on their own salvation because of their sin or not doing the application you suggest.
8. The “Left Field” Finish — Where the conclusion and/or application has very little to do with the passage, your sermon, or anything else.
9. The “Not Again” Finish — Where (for some funny reason) the conclusion is the same as every other conclusion you’ve given for the last three years. It also happens to be your hobby horse and is often one of “pray more, give more, evangelize more, read the Bible more, and come to church more.”
10. The “Gospel out of Nowhere” Finish — Where the preacher feels the absence of the gospel in the message and so levers it in at the conclusion without any sense of connection to what has gone before. (To a thinking listener, this may feel a little forced and intellectually inconsistent.)
And while I'm at it, here's a bonus:
11. The “Tearjerker” Finish — Where the speaker seeks to cement emotional response by throwing in a random and largely disconnected tearjerker of a story (perhaps involving a child, an animal, a death, or whatever). Strapped to this emotional bomb, the preacher hopes the truth of the message will strike home (even though in reality, the truth will probably be smothered in the disconnected emotion of the anecdote).
Landing the Plane
Since I’ve now offered examples of how to finish weakly as your sermon finishes weekly, let’s now ponder what makes a conclusion strong:
As someone who has flown once or twice, let me continue with the airplane analogy since there are several thoughts that can be shared here. Passengers who have had a great journey with a bad landing will leave with their focus entirely on the bad landing. Passengers want the pilot to know where he is going and to take them straight there. They don’t particularly want the pilot to finish a normal journey with a historic televised adrenaline landing. Passengers like a smooth landing, but they’ll generally take a slight bump over repeated attempts to find the perfect one. Once landed, extended taxi-ing is not appreciated. A good landing that takes you by surprise always seems to have a pleasant effect.
The conclusion is a great opportunity to encourage response to and application of the message. Sometimes it is helpful to review the message flow, the main idea, and intended applications. But remember, the conclusion has to include, at some point, the phenomenon known as stopping. Review, encourage, stop.
Standard teaching it may be, but worth mentioning nonetheless: Generally it is not helpful to introduce new information during the conclusion. A concluding story? Maybe that’s OK. But don’t suddenly throw in a new piece of exegetical insight into the preaching passage or rush off to another passage for one last bit of sight-seeing.
Haddon’s Runway—One approach that I particularly appreciate and find hard to emulate is Haddon Robinson’s oft-used approach. It is evident after most Haddon sermons that he carefully planned his final sentence. He flies the plane until he gets there, and then quite naturally the plane lands on that landing strip of just ten to fifteen words and the journey is over—smooth, apparently effortless, immensely effective. As he teaches in class, it’s much better to finish two sentences before listeners think you should than two sentences after!
Post-Landing
Now a few thoughts relating to the post-landing phase of the journey. Sometimes it is helpful to have a closing song, sometimes it is helpful to have a whole set of responsive songs, and sometimes it is better not to allow the singing of a song to help people switch back into their “real world” and leave the sermon behind. Sometimes it’s helpful to leave space for silent response; sometimes that is just plain uncomfortable and overkill. Sometimes quiet music played after can help the contemplative mood; sometimes music blasting out after the meeting can switch people into a frenzied chaos of raised voice fellowship (and the journey is forgotten, I fear!).
After the sermon is over, but still within the confines of the service, sometimes it is helpful to have another person wrap things up—then again, sometimes it can be disastrous. (I can’t help but think of the “helpful” MC who undoes the impact of a global missions thrust with the typical and deeply annoying “and we can all be missionaries right where we are!” . . . thankfully no one added that to the end of Matthew’s gospel or we’d never have read the New Testament!)
Whether the analogy continues to work or not is somewhat unimportant, but these thoughts are worth pondering in our churches:
Some passengers want to get out of the plane and airport at breakneck speed. Like it or not, some people just want or need to flee from the church once things are over. It doesn’t help them to make that difficult. At the same time, no airline I’ve been on will let you leave without a friendly goodbye. Some churches put a lot of energy into greeting/welcoming teams (a very good idea) but let people slip away without human interaction after the service. On the other hand, some churches seem to put barriers to people leaving, or create an environment where people are rushed out before they need to be (the preacher at the door shaking hands with everyone can sometimes create an urgency to vacate the building).
Some passengers need to sit down and let it all sink in. This may be a slight stretch, but some airports (I’m thinking more of the U.S. ones) have seats at the gate so passengers can sit down if they need to. In churches sometimes, there is nowhere for someone to sit and soak for a while. I mentioned the music signal in some places that blasts out an indication that it’s all over now and it’s time to interact (at high volume if you want to be heard). This creates an environment very non-conducive to post-service reflection.
Some passengers need to access further information. I suppose it’s a bit like finding out about connecting flights, but how do people in church know who to go to in order to find out more? Is the preacher accessible, or is he stuck at the door shaking hand after hand and smiling at polite feedback? Is there a way to get someone to pray with? What about finding out about other aspects of church life that could be the next step after this service?
Most passengers will want to talk with someone about their journey. In the travel world, it seems like everyone is ready to say something about what they’ve just experienced (or endured) when they meet a human who actually knows them. In the church world, it often seems like everyone is ready to talk about anything but what they’ve just experienced. But actually, people need to reflect and reinforce and respond in community rather than in isolation. Does your church encourage that kind of interaction?
Today we’ve pondered the art of sermon-stopping. We have thought about weak finishes, and then about the elements in finishing strong. We’ve also considered the elements included in the service after the sermon is over. It certainly is not easy to get the plane down comfortably and effectively. I pray I have offered some constructive alternatives.
Peter Mead is involved in church leadership at an independent Bible church in the UK. He serves as director of Cor Deo—an innovative mentored ministry training program—and has a wider ministry preaching and training preachers. To find out more about Cor Deo, please visit CorDeo.org.uk or Peter's preaching blog at BiblicalPreaching.net.
Reference:
http://www.sermoncentral.com/articlec.asp?article=peter-mead-finish-sermon-strong&Page=1&ac=true&csplit=9060
1. The “Searching for a Runway” Conclusion — This is a common one that we fall into when we fail to plan our conclusion before starting to preach. As the sermon wears on, we become aware of the need to land the plane but have to search for a decent runway on which to land it. Consequently, as we’re coming in to land, we remember that we haven’t reinforced a certain element of the message, so we pull out of the descent and circle around for another attempt. Next time in, we think of half of a conclusion that might work better and so pull out again, circle around, and turn in to another possible landing strip. Needless to say, passengers don’t find this pursuit of a better runway to be particularly comfortable or helpful. When the message drags on a couple of minutes (or ten) longer than it feels like it should, any good done in the sermon tends to be undone rather quickly!
2. The “Just Stop” Conclusion — There are some preachers who don’t seem to be aware of the possibility of a strong finish and so don’t bother to land the plane. It simply drops out of the sky at a certain point. Once all has been said, without any particular effort to conclude the message, it's suddenly over. This is a particular danger for those who go on to announce a closing hymn, I find.
3. The “Overly Climactic” Conclusion — At the other extreme are those who know the potential of a good finale and so overly ramp up the climactic crescendo in the closing stages. After preaching a ho-hum message, they suddenly try to close it off with a fireworks display that will leave everyone stunned and standing open-mouthed with barely an “ooo-aaah” on their lips. Truth is that if the message hasn’t laid the foundation for such an ending, then people will be left stunned and unsure of what to say: “Uuuugh?”
4. The “Uncomfortable Fade” Conclusion — Perhaps the domain of new, inexperienced, and untrained preachers, this follows the general comfort rule of preaching: If you are not comfortable in your preaching, your listeners won’t be either. So the message comes to what might be a decent ending, then the speaker, well, sort of, just adds something like, “That’s all I wanted to say, I think, yeah, so…” (like this paragraph, 20 words too long!)
5. The “Discouraging Finale” Conclusion — Another tendency among some is to preach what might be a generally encouraging message but then undo that encouragement with a final discouraging comment. People need to be left encouraged to respond to the Word and to apply the Word, but some have a peculiar knack for finishing with a motivational fizzle comment.
6. The “Machine Gun” Finish — Wildly fire off a hundred different applications in the final minute in the hope of hitting something—no depth, very shallow, badly aimed, rarely hits the target, and often has nothing to do with the passage.
7. The “Salvation by Works” Finish — After preaching the wonders of God’s grace in Jesus Christ, undermine that grace by throwing doubt on their own salvation because of their sin or not doing the application you suggest.
8. The “Left Field” Finish — Where the conclusion and/or application has very little to do with the passage, your sermon, or anything else.
9. The “Not Again” Finish — Where (for some funny reason) the conclusion is the same as every other conclusion you’ve given for the last three years. It also happens to be your hobby horse and is often one of “pray more, give more, evangelize more, read the Bible more, and come to church more.”
10. The “Gospel out of Nowhere” Finish — Where the preacher feels the absence of the gospel in the message and so levers it in at the conclusion without any sense of connection to what has gone before. (To a thinking listener, this may feel a little forced and intellectually inconsistent.)
And while I'm at it, here's a bonus:
11. The “Tearjerker” Finish — Where the speaker seeks to cement emotional response by throwing in a random and largely disconnected tearjerker of a story (perhaps involving a child, an animal, a death, or whatever). Strapped to this emotional bomb, the preacher hopes the truth of the message will strike home (even though in reality, the truth will probably be smothered in the disconnected emotion of the anecdote).
Landing the Plane
Since I’ve now offered examples of how to finish weakly as your sermon finishes weekly, let’s now ponder what makes a conclusion strong:
As someone who has flown once or twice, let me continue with the airplane analogy since there are several thoughts that can be shared here. Passengers who have had a great journey with a bad landing will leave with their focus entirely on the bad landing. Passengers want the pilot to know where he is going and to take them straight there. They don’t particularly want the pilot to finish a normal journey with a historic televised adrenaline landing. Passengers like a smooth landing, but they’ll generally take a slight bump over repeated attempts to find the perfect one. Once landed, extended taxi-ing is not appreciated. A good landing that takes you by surprise always seems to have a pleasant effect.
The conclusion is a great opportunity to encourage response to and application of the message. Sometimes it is helpful to review the message flow, the main idea, and intended applications. But remember, the conclusion has to include, at some point, the phenomenon known as stopping. Review, encourage, stop.
Standard teaching it may be, but worth mentioning nonetheless: Generally it is not helpful to introduce new information during the conclusion. A concluding story? Maybe that’s OK. But don’t suddenly throw in a new piece of exegetical insight into the preaching passage or rush off to another passage for one last bit of sight-seeing.
Haddon’s Runway—One approach that I particularly appreciate and find hard to emulate is Haddon Robinson’s oft-used approach. It is evident after most Haddon sermons that he carefully planned his final sentence. He flies the plane until he gets there, and then quite naturally the plane lands on that landing strip of just ten to fifteen words and the journey is over—smooth, apparently effortless, immensely effective. As he teaches in class, it’s much better to finish two sentences before listeners think you should than two sentences after!
Post-Landing
Now a few thoughts relating to the post-landing phase of the journey. Sometimes it is helpful to have a closing song, sometimes it is helpful to have a whole set of responsive songs, and sometimes it is better not to allow the singing of a song to help people switch back into their “real world” and leave the sermon behind. Sometimes it’s helpful to leave space for silent response; sometimes that is just plain uncomfortable and overkill. Sometimes quiet music played after can help the contemplative mood; sometimes music blasting out after the meeting can switch people into a frenzied chaos of raised voice fellowship (and the journey is forgotten, I fear!).
After the sermon is over, but still within the confines of the service, sometimes it is helpful to have another person wrap things up—then again, sometimes it can be disastrous. (I can’t help but think of the “helpful” MC who undoes the impact of a global missions thrust with the typical and deeply annoying “and we can all be missionaries right where we are!” . . . thankfully no one added that to the end of Matthew’s gospel or we’d never have read the New Testament!)
Whether the analogy continues to work or not is somewhat unimportant, but these thoughts are worth pondering in our churches:
Some passengers want to get out of the plane and airport at breakneck speed. Like it or not, some people just want or need to flee from the church once things are over. It doesn’t help them to make that difficult. At the same time, no airline I’ve been on will let you leave without a friendly goodbye. Some churches put a lot of energy into greeting/welcoming teams (a very good idea) but let people slip away without human interaction after the service. On the other hand, some churches seem to put barriers to people leaving, or create an environment where people are rushed out before they need to be (the preacher at the door shaking hands with everyone can sometimes create an urgency to vacate the building).
Some passengers need to sit down and let it all sink in. This may be a slight stretch, but some airports (I’m thinking more of the U.S. ones) have seats at the gate so passengers can sit down if they need to. In churches sometimes, there is nowhere for someone to sit and soak for a while. I mentioned the music signal in some places that blasts out an indication that it’s all over now and it’s time to interact (at high volume if you want to be heard). This creates an environment very non-conducive to post-service reflection.
Some passengers need to access further information. I suppose it’s a bit like finding out about connecting flights, but how do people in church know who to go to in order to find out more? Is the preacher accessible, or is he stuck at the door shaking hand after hand and smiling at polite feedback? Is there a way to get someone to pray with? What about finding out about other aspects of church life that could be the next step after this service?
Most passengers will want to talk with someone about their journey. In the travel world, it seems like everyone is ready to say something about what they’ve just experienced (or endured) when they meet a human who actually knows them. In the church world, it often seems like everyone is ready to talk about anything but what they’ve just experienced. But actually, people need to reflect and reinforce and respond in community rather than in isolation. Does your church encourage that kind of interaction?
Today we’ve pondered the art of sermon-stopping. We have thought about weak finishes, and then about the elements in finishing strong. We’ve also considered the elements included in the service after the sermon is over. It certainly is not easy to get the plane down comfortably and effectively. I pray I have offered some constructive alternatives.
Peter Mead is involved in church leadership at an independent Bible church in the UK. He serves as director of Cor Deo—an innovative mentored ministry training program—and has a wider ministry preaching and training preachers. To find out more about Cor Deo, please visit CorDeo.org.uk or Peter's preaching blog at BiblicalPreaching.net.
Reference:
http://www.sermoncentral.com/articlec.asp?article=peter-mead-finish-sermon-strong&Page=1&ac=true&csplit=9060
Minggu, 16 Mei 2010
Matthew 28:16-20
The first distinction of Matthew's version of the Great Commission is the fact that all authority has been given to Jesus.
All is a key word in this passage, being used four times:
Jesus has been given all authority;
the disciples must go to all the nations;
the disciples must teach them to obey all things;
Jesus is with the disciples all the days
[David J. Bosch, "The Structure of Mission: An Exposition of Matthew 28:16-20." In Exploring Church Growth, ed. Wilbur Shenk, 218-48. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1983.]
All is a key word in this passage, being used four times:
Jesus has been given all authority;
the disciples must go to all the nations;
the disciples must teach them to obey all things;
Jesus is with the disciples all the days
[David J. Bosch, "The Structure of Mission: An Exposition of Matthew 28:16-20." In Exploring Church Growth, ed. Wilbur Shenk, 218-48. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1983.]
Rabu, 03 Februari 2010
The Tower of Babel and the three angels' messages
The Tower of Babel and the three angels' messages
Elijah Mvundura is a freelance writer from Indiana.
This article was published in the April 2002 issue of Ministry.
The problem of ethnic pluralism and coexistence is now universal. In some ways, this has always I been the case. Humans have forever feared diversity and striven for uniformity. That is why, throughout history, ethnic, racial, and religious minorities have been victims of exclusion or oppression. Alongside these conflicts there also exists an irrepressible longing for a homogeneous society. Indeed it is this longing that often gives birth to the conflict!
The longing for a homogeneous community can be traced back to the Tower of Babel. Against God's explicit order to disperse over the earth, many humans stayed put. The builders of Babel built a city and a tower whose summit would reach into the heavens. Thus they planned to make a name for them selves. But the well-known biblical account says that God came down, confused their language, and scattered them over the face of the earth (Gen. 11:1-9).
It is significant to note that insofar as linguistic and ethnic diversity was inscribed in God's command to disperse, diversity is a positive, divine intention an intention, however, often opposed by humans.
Bernhard W. Anderson is certainly correct when he says that, taken by itself the story of Babel portrays a clash of human and divine wills. Humans tried "to maintain a primeval unity, based on one language, a central living space, and a single aim. It is God who counteracts this movement toward a center with a centrifugal force that disperses them into linguistic, spatial, and ethnic diversity."1
Admittedly, Anderson's exegesis is not universally accepted. A majority of modern theologians follow their medieval predecessors in seeing diversity not as a divine intention but as a necessary evil, a result of human sinfulness. But Anderson supports his exegesis by situating the story of Babel in the larger biblical perspective. He contends that ethnic diversity corresponds with the rich diversity in the nonhuman creation: different trees, plants, birds, fish, animals, and heavenly bodies. And God not only affirmed this diversity at Babel but also at Pentecost. There the Holy Spirit worked not by making different nations understand the language of the Twelve, but rather by making each nation hear the gospel in its own language.
Anderson goes on to say that the eschatological portrayals of the consummation of God's historical purpose do not envision a homogenized humanity but rather a human unity which truly embraces diversity (Isa. 2:1- 4; Rev. 7:9-12).2 This may be illustrated by God's positive intention as He composed the nation of Israel in the form of twelve different tribes rather than as one monolithic unit.
Diversity despite rebellion against it
Anderson's interpretation gains additional force when viewed in the context of the great controversy between good and evil. For there was more than mere human hubris in the builders' aim to construct a tower "'whose top will reach into heaven.'" There was also the desire to immortalize their names and deter mine their own destiny (Gen. 11:4, NAS).
The aim and nature of the project strongly echoes the original ambitions of the devil. "'I will ascend to heaven; I will raise my throne above the stars of God ... I will make myself like the Most High'" (Isa. 14:13, 14, NIV). If Lucifer was thrust to the earth because of his rebellion (verse 15), so were the builders of the tower cast down and scattered abroad over the face of the earth (Gen. 11:9).
Share the Hope 2009
Yet, despite the display of divine supremacy, the rebellion continued. "And when the dragon saw that he was thrown down to the earth, he persecuted the woman" (Rev. 12:13, NAS). Satan employs human instruments in his war against the saints (Dan. 7:21). That is why, in Daniel and Revelation, kingdoms are depicted not just as political powers but also as symbols of evil. "In apocalyptic perspective, history is the scene of a cosmic struggle between God and Satan, the ruler of the present evil age, who seeks to establish a rival kingdom and seduce human beings into his service."3
Taken as a paradigm of Lucifer's attempt to displace God as the Sovereign of the universe, the Babel story has been literally replicated repeatedly in the political history of the world. The idea of a universal empire, of bringing the whole world under one rule, as Pierre Manent noted, has had a powerful hold on people's minds.4
Marcel Gauchet observes that the logic of the empire is at its heart opposed to ethical monotheism, because a universal God demands universal dominion.5 Not without significance, all imperialistic projects, from the ancient Assyrian Empire to Nazi Germany typically tried to wipe out linguistic and ethnic distinctions. They tried to undo what God decreed. But they were all undone by God's word. "'So the people will be a mixture and will not remain united, any more than iron mixes with clay'" (Dan. 2:43, NIV).
Apparently, the principle of diversity is a divine barrier that has frustrated the human-willed and devil-inspired drive toward universality and constitutional homogeneity. But this is not to say that God revels in, or is a source of human disunity. Far from it.
Uniformity does not necessarily mean amity and friendship among the nations, for if people do not divide along racial and ethnic lines they will do so along class, gender, or ideological lines. This is because human sinfulness is the real source of disunity and discord; unless it is uprooted, there will never be harmony.
This brings us to Abraham. Through him, God set in motion a plan for universal harmony. Abraham was promised the very things that the builders of the tower had willed for themselves: a great name, a universal dominion, and immortality (Gen. 12:2-3).
Authentic unity according to the Cross
To be sure, it is through Abraham's seed Christ (Gal. 3:16) that "the sovereignty, the dominion, and the greatness of all the kingdoms under the whole heaven will be given to the . . . saints" (Dan. 7:27, NAS). But between the promise and its fulfillment stands the Cross. There Jesus died so as to "gather together into one the children of God who are scattered abroad" (John 11:52, NAS).
There "God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself" (2 Cor. 5:19, NAS). If at the tower God came down and scattered, at the Cross He came down and gathered. Before His death, Jesus Himself said, "'And I have other sheep, which are not of this fold; I must bring them also, and they shall hear My voice; and they shall become one flock with one shepherd'" (John 10:16, NAS).
This quality of unity, affirmed at Pentecost, did not mean sameness or the obliteration of linguistic and ethnic diversity. The gospel was to speak the languages of the world and not vice versa.
Accordingly, or at least by illustration, the New Testament, following the Septuagint, was written in Greek. Later it was translated into Syriac and Latin. Unfortunately, in the Middle Ages the clerical elite blocked the translation of the Bible into vernacular languages. It is significant to note that much of the clerics' resistance to vernacular translations and their attempts to monopolize literacy stemmed from their Babel-like bid to build a universal Christian empire.
The Protestant Reformation and the printing revolution of the sixteenth century shattered this dream.6 As the Bible was translated into vernacular languages, the gap between Protestants and Catholics widened to produce divergent theological and cultural traditions. The mass translation of the Bible was a consequential "starting point for the development of national languages and literatures,"7 and also a stimulus, opening the way for modern nationalism.8
In fact, all the national, religious, cultural, and ideological divisions of the modern West can be traced to the floodgates opened by the mass translation of the Bible and the Protestant Reformation.
Putting aside the consequences of this fragmentation, of interest here is the fact that the breakup of Christendom may well be seen as a rerun of the Babel story, a conflict of centripetal and centrifugal forces, in which the centrifugal won out.
Babel and the eternal gospel
To put this dialectic into perspective, we must shade our view of diversity as a concession to minorities a missionary strategy or a response to globalization. This calls for recognizing diversity as of divine origin as we place it near the very heart of the gospel, the eternal gospel of Revelation 14:6. It is significant that the universal call to worship the Creator-God (verses 6, 7) is followed by a universal declaration of the fall of Babylon, a symbol of rebellion against God (verse 8).
In this juxtaposition of the two powers who might be worshiped the created or the Creator, the principles of "the two great powers contending for the supremacy of the world"9 come out in sharp relief. Whereas the national, ethnic, and linguistic identities of those who worship God is recognized and affirmed by God's love and service to the individual, those who worship the beast and his image are unspecified and denied, signifying Satan's indifference and hatred for human welfare.
In God's love, which includes His call for human beings to love even their enemies (Matt. 5:43-48), we come to the deciding factor in the judgment announced by the first angel (Rev. 14:7). God's wrath is directed at Babylon's self-love, self-worship, and self-centeredness, reflected in its violent denial of human love, service, and diversity.
In a significant way, the confusion and restlessness of Babylon (verses 10, 11) can be fixed in the contradiction between its drive for Babel-like uniformity and the reality of human diversity which it ignores. This contradiction also explains why all human projects of homogenization and totalization whether at the level of politics (imperialism), economics (globalization), religion (ecumenism), or ideology (Hegelism and Marxism) have failed and are destined to fail.
Only in Christ do "all things hold together" (Col. 1:17, 18, NAS). And with Christ at the center, holding all things together, diversity does not degenerate into discord and relativism or nihilism. Instead, this whole becomes a cosmic symphony of divine wisdom and love (Rev. 7:9-12).
This symphony is the "mystery of Christ" mentioned in Ephesians 3:4. Here Paul echoes the "mystery of God" in Revelation 10:7. Significantly, in both contexts the phrase is linked with the consummation of the divine purpose in history, as revealed to the prophets.
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As "the manifold wisdom of God," the unity of Jew and Gentile in Christ is to be "made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places" (Eph. 3:10, NAS). That revelation of the mystery of God's love is what will inaugurate a new world order and bring history, as we know it, to an end.
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1 Bernhard W. Anderson, From Creation to New Creation: Old Testament Perspectives (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1994), 166.
2 Ibid., 167.
3 Ibid., 36, 37.
4 Pierre Manent, An Intellectual History of Liberalism, tr. Rebecca Balinski (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1995), 3.
5 Marcel Gauchet, The Disenchantment of the World: A Political History of Religion, tr. Oscar Burge (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1997), 116.
6 Elizabeth L. Eisenstein, The Printing Revolution in Early Modern Europe (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 148-186.
7 Ibid., 163.
8 See Liah Greenfeld, Nationalism: Five Roads to Modernity (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1992).
9 Ellen G. White, The Desire of Ages (Nampa, Idaho: Pacific Press Pub. Assn., 1940), 324.
Article ID: 2211
Elijah Mvundura is a freelance writer from Indiana.
This article was published in the April 2002 issue of Ministry.
The problem of ethnic pluralism and coexistence is now universal. In some ways, this has always I been the case. Humans have forever feared diversity and striven for uniformity. That is why, throughout history, ethnic, racial, and religious minorities have been victims of exclusion or oppression. Alongside these conflicts there also exists an irrepressible longing for a homogeneous society. Indeed it is this longing that often gives birth to the conflict!
The longing for a homogeneous community can be traced back to the Tower of Babel. Against God's explicit order to disperse over the earth, many humans stayed put. The builders of Babel built a city and a tower whose summit would reach into the heavens. Thus they planned to make a name for them selves. But the well-known biblical account says that God came down, confused their language, and scattered them over the face of the earth (Gen. 11:1-9).
It is significant to note that insofar as linguistic and ethnic diversity was inscribed in God's command to disperse, diversity is a positive, divine intention an intention, however, often opposed by humans.
Bernhard W. Anderson is certainly correct when he says that, taken by itself the story of Babel portrays a clash of human and divine wills. Humans tried "to maintain a primeval unity, based on one language, a central living space, and a single aim. It is God who counteracts this movement toward a center with a centrifugal force that disperses them into linguistic, spatial, and ethnic diversity."1
Admittedly, Anderson's exegesis is not universally accepted. A majority of modern theologians follow their medieval predecessors in seeing diversity not as a divine intention but as a necessary evil, a result of human sinfulness. But Anderson supports his exegesis by situating the story of Babel in the larger biblical perspective. He contends that ethnic diversity corresponds with the rich diversity in the nonhuman creation: different trees, plants, birds, fish, animals, and heavenly bodies. And God not only affirmed this diversity at Babel but also at Pentecost. There the Holy Spirit worked not by making different nations understand the language of the Twelve, but rather by making each nation hear the gospel in its own language.
Anderson goes on to say that the eschatological portrayals of the consummation of God's historical purpose do not envision a homogenized humanity but rather a human unity which truly embraces diversity (Isa. 2:1- 4; Rev. 7:9-12).2 This may be illustrated by God's positive intention as He composed the nation of Israel in the form of twelve different tribes rather than as one monolithic unit.
Diversity despite rebellion against it
Anderson's interpretation gains additional force when viewed in the context of the great controversy between good and evil. For there was more than mere human hubris in the builders' aim to construct a tower "'whose top will reach into heaven.'" There was also the desire to immortalize their names and deter mine their own destiny (Gen. 11:4, NAS).
The aim and nature of the project strongly echoes the original ambitions of the devil. "'I will ascend to heaven; I will raise my throne above the stars of God ... I will make myself like the Most High'" (Isa. 14:13, 14, NIV). If Lucifer was thrust to the earth because of his rebellion (verse 15), so were the builders of the tower cast down and scattered abroad over the face of the earth (Gen. 11:9).
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Yet, despite the display of divine supremacy, the rebellion continued. "And when the dragon saw that he was thrown down to the earth, he persecuted the woman" (Rev. 12:13, NAS). Satan employs human instruments in his war against the saints (Dan. 7:21). That is why, in Daniel and Revelation, kingdoms are depicted not just as political powers but also as symbols of evil. "In apocalyptic perspective, history is the scene of a cosmic struggle between God and Satan, the ruler of the present evil age, who seeks to establish a rival kingdom and seduce human beings into his service."3
Taken as a paradigm of Lucifer's attempt to displace God as the Sovereign of the universe, the Babel story has been literally replicated repeatedly in the political history of the world. The idea of a universal empire, of bringing the whole world under one rule, as Pierre Manent noted, has had a powerful hold on people's minds.4
Marcel Gauchet observes that the logic of the empire is at its heart opposed to ethical monotheism, because a universal God demands universal dominion.5 Not without significance, all imperialistic projects, from the ancient Assyrian Empire to Nazi Germany typically tried to wipe out linguistic and ethnic distinctions. They tried to undo what God decreed. But they were all undone by God's word. "'So the people will be a mixture and will not remain united, any more than iron mixes with clay'" (Dan. 2:43, NIV).
Apparently, the principle of diversity is a divine barrier that has frustrated the human-willed and devil-inspired drive toward universality and constitutional homogeneity. But this is not to say that God revels in, or is a source of human disunity. Far from it.
Uniformity does not necessarily mean amity and friendship among the nations, for if people do not divide along racial and ethnic lines they will do so along class, gender, or ideological lines. This is because human sinfulness is the real source of disunity and discord; unless it is uprooted, there will never be harmony.
This brings us to Abraham. Through him, God set in motion a plan for universal harmony. Abraham was promised the very things that the builders of the tower had willed for themselves: a great name, a universal dominion, and immortality (Gen. 12:2-3).
Authentic unity according to the Cross
To be sure, it is through Abraham's seed Christ (Gal. 3:16) that "the sovereignty, the dominion, and the greatness of all the kingdoms under the whole heaven will be given to the . . . saints" (Dan. 7:27, NAS). But between the promise and its fulfillment stands the Cross. There Jesus died so as to "gather together into one the children of God who are scattered abroad" (John 11:52, NAS).
There "God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself" (2 Cor. 5:19, NAS). If at the tower God came down and scattered, at the Cross He came down and gathered. Before His death, Jesus Himself said, "'And I have other sheep, which are not of this fold; I must bring them also, and they shall hear My voice; and they shall become one flock with one shepherd'" (John 10:16, NAS).
This quality of unity, affirmed at Pentecost, did not mean sameness or the obliteration of linguistic and ethnic diversity. The gospel was to speak the languages of the world and not vice versa.
Accordingly, or at least by illustration, the New Testament, following the Septuagint, was written in Greek. Later it was translated into Syriac and Latin. Unfortunately, in the Middle Ages the clerical elite blocked the translation of the Bible into vernacular languages. It is significant to note that much of the clerics' resistance to vernacular translations and their attempts to monopolize literacy stemmed from their Babel-like bid to build a universal Christian empire.
The Protestant Reformation and the printing revolution of the sixteenth century shattered this dream.6 As the Bible was translated into vernacular languages, the gap between Protestants and Catholics widened to produce divergent theological and cultural traditions. The mass translation of the Bible was a consequential "starting point for the development of national languages and literatures,"7 and also a stimulus, opening the way for modern nationalism.8
In fact, all the national, religious, cultural, and ideological divisions of the modern West can be traced to the floodgates opened by the mass translation of the Bible and the Protestant Reformation.
Putting aside the consequences of this fragmentation, of interest here is the fact that the breakup of Christendom may well be seen as a rerun of the Babel story, a conflict of centripetal and centrifugal forces, in which the centrifugal won out.
Babel and the eternal gospel
To put this dialectic into perspective, we must shade our view of diversity as a concession to minorities a missionary strategy or a response to globalization. This calls for recognizing diversity as of divine origin as we place it near the very heart of the gospel, the eternal gospel of Revelation 14:6. It is significant that the universal call to worship the Creator-God (verses 6, 7) is followed by a universal declaration of the fall of Babylon, a symbol of rebellion against God (verse 8).
In this juxtaposition of the two powers who might be worshiped the created or the Creator, the principles of "the two great powers contending for the supremacy of the world"9 come out in sharp relief. Whereas the national, ethnic, and linguistic identities of those who worship God is recognized and affirmed by God's love and service to the individual, those who worship the beast and his image are unspecified and denied, signifying Satan's indifference and hatred for human welfare.
In God's love, which includes His call for human beings to love even their enemies (Matt. 5:43-48), we come to the deciding factor in the judgment announced by the first angel (Rev. 14:7). God's wrath is directed at Babylon's self-love, self-worship, and self-centeredness, reflected in its violent denial of human love, service, and diversity.
In a significant way, the confusion and restlessness of Babylon (verses 10, 11) can be fixed in the contradiction between its drive for Babel-like uniformity and the reality of human diversity which it ignores. This contradiction also explains why all human projects of homogenization and totalization whether at the level of politics (imperialism), economics (globalization), religion (ecumenism), or ideology (Hegelism and Marxism) have failed and are destined to fail.
Only in Christ do "all things hold together" (Col. 1:17, 18, NAS). And with Christ at the center, holding all things together, diversity does not degenerate into discord and relativism or nihilism. Instead, this whole becomes a cosmic symphony of divine wisdom and love (Rev. 7:9-12).
This symphony is the "mystery of Christ" mentioned in Ephesians 3:4. Here Paul echoes the "mystery of God" in Revelation 10:7. Significantly, in both contexts the phrase is linked with the consummation of the divine purpose in history, as revealed to the prophets.
Quit Now! Highly successful smoking cessation program
As "the manifold wisdom of God," the unity of Jew and Gentile in Christ is to be "made known through the church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places" (Eph. 3:10, NAS). That revelation of the mystery of God's love is what will inaugurate a new world order and bring history, as we know it, to an end.
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1 Bernhard W. Anderson, From Creation to New Creation: Old Testament Perspectives (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1994), 166.
2 Ibid., 167.
3 Ibid., 36, 37.
4 Pierre Manent, An Intellectual History of Liberalism, tr. Rebecca Balinski (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1995), 3.
5 Marcel Gauchet, The Disenchantment of the World: A Political History of Religion, tr. Oscar Burge (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1997), 116.
6 Elizabeth L. Eisenstein, The Printing Revolution in Early Modern Europe (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 148-186.
7 Ibid., 163.
8 See Liah Greenfeld, Nationalism: Five Roads to Modernity (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1992).
9 Ellen G. White, The Desire of Ages (Nampa, Idaho: Pacific Press Pub. Assn., 1940), 324.
Article ID: 2211
Jumat, 27 November 2009
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