Towards a Style of Life

Selected Excerpts from Jacques Ellul's, "The Presence of the Kingdom"

"Day after day the wind blows away the pages of our calendars, our newspapers, and our political regimes, and we glide along the stream of time without any spiritual framework, without a memory, without a judgment, carried about by "all winds of doctrine" on the current of history, which is always slipping into a perpetual past. Now we ought to react vigorously against this slackness - this tendency to drift. If we are to live in this world we need to know it far more profoundly; we need to rediscover the meaning of events, and the spiritual framework which our contemporaries have lost. This will be a difficult enterprise, for it is new and humble. But "all things are ours," that is, for us as Christians, and we are able to undertake this new work.

"The Bible tells us that the Christian is in the world, and that there he or she must remain. Christians have not been created in order to separate themselves from, or to live aloof from, the world. When this separation is effected, it will be God's own doing, not man's; this final separation will take place at the end of time, when God will "gather the wheat into his barn," but the tares will be rooted up and burned. Similarly, Christians are not meant to live together in closed groups, refusing to mix with other people. The Christian community must never be a closed body. Thus if the Christian is necessarily in the world, he is not of it. This means that his thought, his life, and his heart are not controlled by the world, and do not depend upon the world. The Christian belongs to another Master, and has been sent into this world by this Master, and his communion with his Master remains unbroken, in spite of the world in which he has to live.

"But this communion of the Christian with Jesus Christ has some serious implications: first of all, the Christian, by this very fact, finds that he is not confronted by the material forces of the world but by its spiritual reality. Because he is in communion with Jesus Christ he has to fight not against flesh and blood but against "the principalities, against the powers, against the world‐rulers of this darkness." At the same time this communion assures him that he does not belong to the world, that he is free from the fatality of the world which is moving toward death, and, as a result of this liberation by grace, he can fight against the spiritual realities of the world. To speak quite plainly, he is called to break the fatality which hangs over the world, and he can do so.

"If this, then, is the Christian's situation, what part should he play in the life of the world? It is only too easy to reply: to "witness," to "evangelize," or "to lead a Christian life," or again "to act according to the will of God." All this is true, of course, but so long as it is not really understood, so long as each answer is only a traditional formula, it leads us nowhere. Now it is the Bible which shows us what the Christian "calling" really is; it enables us to understand this situation, and it shows us what concrete action is required.

"Let us meditate once more on that incisive saying of our Lord: "Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast your pearls before the swine, lest haply they trample them under their feet, and turn and rend you" (Matt. 7:6). This is a striking description of the relation between the church and the world at the present time. The church, which has received the "pearls" of the gospel, throws them with pious indifference as food to the "swine," who are human beings (and this includes ourselves, "good Christians") embedded in the clay of this world which is so exclusively materialistic, submerged by economic and political problems, by their personal fears and their financial worries, by their anxieties and their daily troubles, absolutely dominated by the spirit of the present age. And these people turn against the church, saying: "We find no nourishment in your pearls, no satisfaction in their beauty. What are we to do with them? They are no good to us in our present situation!" These people are wrong: it is not the Word that needs to be changed, and to bring them something; it is their own position that needs to be changed. But they are right in their feeling about the church, because it is the church that ought to initiate this changed situation, in order that the Word of God may be heard in human life as a whole. And the church has no right to confine itself to "casting pearls before swine." First of all, the church should do some preparatory work, in order that "the swine" may be able to receive "the pearls." It is not for the church to separate human beings into two categories - first of all the "swine" to whom we cannot proclaim the gospel, and, secondly, those who are not "swine," those dull, good "sheep," which our world creates in such numbers!

"What the church ought to do is to try to place all people in an economic, intellectual - yes, and also in a psychological and physical - situation, which is such that they can actually hear this gospel - that they can be sufficiently responsible to say yes or no, that they can be sufficiently alive for these words to have some meaning for them. The secret of their choice belongs to God, but they should be able to make a decision; it is up to the church to see to it that they are not placed in such conditions that they cannot react otherwise than as swine, to whom pearls have been thrown. "Cast not your pearls before swine" - but men must cease to be swine, and this is not the work of grace, it is a human work, which man is quite able to achieve, though it is terribly difficult to do; Christians in particular are called to this work, because it is possible for them to see the true situation of man better than other people, and because they can see, better than others, where all this ought to lead, and what is its aim.

"When we seek to discover effective action for the church, owing to the necessity for its intervention in the world, it seems as though its first objective should be the creation of a style of life. For if we consider the life of Christians in our churches, we see certainly that they make good children, parents, spouses, employers, and workmen - "good, like good bread," said Aragon - they have many individual virtues, but they have no style of life: or rather, they have exactly that which has been imposed upon them by their sociological conditions - by their social class, their nation, their environment, and so on. It is not their spiritual condition that affects their style of life; it is their political or economic condition, and from this point of view, they are an overwhelming demonstration of the truth, temporary and temporal, of Marxism. Now at the present time, many Christians are fully aware that this is an intolerable situation, and that if it is allowed to go on, it will prepare the way for the total collapse of the churches of the West. This problem of the style of life is absolutely central; for it is at this point that the question of the integration of Christianity into the world, or at least of its creative power, will be most fiercely tested.

"The creation of such a style of life is a work that is both collective and individual. It is a fact for each Christian who really tries to express his faith in the concrete forms of his life. It is also the task of Christians as a corporate body, where all these efforts, sometimes differing widely, sometimes even contradictory, are recorded. It does not matter whether all these efforts are in logical agreement. The formation of a style of life could not be the result of a doctrine, firmly and clearly established, which it would then be sufficient to put into practice. On the contrary it is the fact of living in faith; consequently it cannot satisfy us on the administrative or intellectual plane. But it is here that doctrine finds its human basis, and its power for action. On the other hand, it is very evident that ecclesiastical bodies, and "prophets," too, can lead the "flock" of the church in a certain sense, by the formation of this style of life - can evoke new inquiries, and can support those who are risking something in this adventure of the spirit.

"Now... the whole of life is concerned in this search. It includes the way we think about present political questions, as well as our way of practicing hospitality. It also affects the way we dress and the food we eat (our austere bourgeois friends ought to understand that the problems of taste, fashion, cooking, are important, if we are to form a style of life: but it is not sufficient to be simply "in the fashion" - it is, indeed, the opposite - or to "choose the best [commercial] quality," which has nothing to do with it!) as well as the way in which we manage our financial affairs. It includes being faithful to one's wife as well as being accessible to one's neighbor. It includes the position one ought to take on current social and political questions, as well as the decisions which relate to the personal employment of our time. I could multiply these examples, which are mere suggestions, to show that absolutely everything, the smallest details which we regard as indifferent, ought to be questioned, placed in the light of faith, examined from the point of view of the glory of God. It is on this condition that, in the church, we might possibly discover a new style of Christian life, voluntary and true.

"There is, however, one very important truth which needs to be stressed: namely, that such research is necessarily a corporate act. It is impossible for an isolated Christian to follow this path. I believe, in fact, that one of the essential conditions for its realization is the substitution of a true solidarity among Christians (a solidarity - voluntarily created by obedience to the will of God) for the sociological solidarity, purely mechanical in character, which is being dinned into our ears, and which people want to make the basis of the new world. In order to undertake this search for a new style of life, every Christian ought to feel and to know that he is supported by others, not only for spiritual and ideological reasons - because, for instance, of the difficulty of the problems that our world sets for man - but also for purely material reasons: for example, for a workman, for a minor employee, the question of a choice in his way of living or in his trade is immediately expressed in terms of money. So long as the solidarity between Christians is not expressed in mutual help, which will permit everyone to find a balanced life, to discover a style of life that truly expresses his faith (and not in order to avoid starving), it will only be a matter of words. This alone shows us this search may lead us into paths which are very disagreeable to our cherished habits. In actual fact, it will be very disagreeable, but it is at this price that the good news of salvation in Christ will be something different from a human word among other human words.

"The enemies of the church seek to turn it aside from its own way, in order to make it follow their way; the moment it yields it becomes the plaything of the forces of the world. It is given up to its adversaries. It can only have recourse to God in prayer, that he may teach it his way, which no one else can teach it. This means not only the way of eternal salvation, but the way which one follows in the land of the living, the way which is truly impossible to find unless God reveals it, truly impossible to follow with our human power alone. The problem is the same in the social and the individual sphere. From the human point of view this way of the church in the world is foolish, utopian, and ineffective, and we are seized with discouragement when we see what we really have to do in this real world. We might throw the whole thing up, were we not sure of seeing the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living: but we have seen this goodness, it has been manifested, and on this foundation we can go forward and confront the powers of this world, in spite of our impotence, for "in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Rom. 8:37-39)."

-------------------------------

Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying,
‘See, the home of God is among mortals.
He will dwell with them;
they will be his peoples,
and God himself will be with them;
he will wipe every tear from their eyes.
Death will be no more;
mourning and crying and pain will be no more,
for the first things have passed away.’

And the one who was seated on the throne said, ‘See, I am making all things new.’

Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city. On either side of the river is the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, producing its fruit each month; and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. Nothing accursed will be found there any more. But the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and his servants will worship him; they will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads. And there will be no more night; they need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will reign for ever and ever.

See, I am coming soon; my reward is with me, to repay according to everyone’s work. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.’

Blessed are those who wash their robes, so that they will have the right to the tree of life and may enter the city by the gates.

The Spirit and the bride say, ‘Come.’
And let everyone who hears say, ‘Come.’
And let everyone who is thirsty come.
Let anyone who wishes take the water of life as a gift.
The one who testifies to these things says, ‘Surely I am coming soon.’

Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!

An Introduction to Apocalyptic Symbolism

An important theme in the Book of Revelation is its scathing critique of political power. Drawing on a rich apocalyptic tradition, this book shifts our focus from the earthly realm to the heavenly in order to show us the true nature of worldly power, as well as where real power lies. In the Apocalypse, however, it is not the symbols that refer to the historical situation, but it is the historical which serves as the symbol for the eternal. The force of Revelation’s message lies in “the ‘evocative’ power of its symbols as well as in its hortatory, imaginative, emotional language and dramatic movement, which engages the hearer (reader) by eliciting reactions, emotions, convictions and identifications.” This deployment of myth and symbol deliberately disrupts and recreates the symbolic universe of its audience. It draws us out of the dominant ideology of our culture – out of the comfort and security of the Pax Romana – by transforming “peace” and “security” into allegiance with the Dragon – the most hazardous position of all.

The most blatant and provocative image employed by John in this regard is that of the beast from the sea, who gives glory to the Dragon. In this symbol, John appropriates the imagery of Daniel in a new way to refer to the current Roman Empire, and through it, to all evil empires. The metaphor is continued and expanded, however, when the first beast is joined by a second one from the land. Just as the beast from the sea glorifies the Dragon, the beast from the land glorifies the beast from the sea. It mimics the lamb in its appearance, but its words are the words of the Dragon. Thus, it represents that which directs people to worship the first beast and to follow it. A third image that illustrates John’s understanding of political power is that of the Great Prostitute, Babylon. “The woman… is the great city, which reigns over the kings of the earth” (17:18). It is important to note that the City is a universal concept for John, and particular cities, such as Babylon or Rome, are simply seen as “incarnations” of that idea. His criticism of Power and the City, therefore, applies today as much as it did then. “What the Apocalypse describes under the form of two beasts is not only a state, but the state; not only a particular political (of right or left, etc.) but the primacy of the political.” Likewise, the description of the Woman atop the Beast encompasses all cities past and present.

John utilizes a combination of the myths, symbols, and social realities of his readers and adapts them to his theological worldview in order to create in them new, relevant, and ultimately subversive ways of understanding the world in which they live. The Apocalypse reshapes our understanding of the world as a place of conflict, then redefines what it means to resist – and indeed to battle – the Dragon. In the mythic universe of John’s Apocalypse, the only weapons available to the followers of the Lamb are their testimony and the Word of God. By this, John induces his audience to actively resist the Dragon by maintaining a faithful witness to the dominion of God.

resonate

Part of our bigger family. Consider joining the mailing in particular (link below). From the Resonate website:

"Welcome to Resonate. We are a network of Canadians striving to love God and our neighbors in a changing culture.

"As one worldview transitions into another, we realize that we are living in an exciting but challenging time. This transition has had a lot of labels stuck on it, postmodern, emerging church, and a bunch of other labels and clichés. Around here, we aren't big on labels but we do agree that the world is changing and like any time of transition, courageous people respond to the call to move forward in faith. We are a network of sojourners responding to that call together across Canada.

"Resonate exists to facilitate conversations and friendships among people across Canada through both national and regional dialogues. It also partners with church planters through our Greenhouses across the country to bring people together, support each other, and help partner with God in building the Kingdom.

"It doesn't cost anything to get involved, no DNA testing, botox treatments, or even a Winnipeg Bluebombers tattoo, just a desire to journey with people trying to navigate a changing culture and trying to figure out how to follow Jesus Christ in it. We are glad you stopped by and we are looking forward to talking more with you. Peace."

Church Politics

From Stanley Hauerwas' A Community of Character: Towards a Constructive Christian Ethic

Any consideration of the development of virtuous people as a political issue seems an inexcusable intrusion into personal liberty... We have almost forgotten that the church is also a polity that at one time had the confidence to encourage in its members virtues sufficient to sustain their role as citizens in a society whose purpose was to counter the unwarranted claims made by other societies and states. Indeed, only if such people exist is it possible for the state to be "secular." Because the church rarely now engenders such a people and community, it has failed our particular secular polity: Christians have lacked the power that would enable themselves and others to perceive and interpret the kind of society in which we live. Christians have rightly thought that they have a proper investment in making this, and other societies, more nearly just, but have forgotten that genuine justice depends on more profound moral convictions than our secular polity can politically acknowledge.

Christians must again understand that their first task is not to make the world better or more just, but to recognize what the world is - and why it is that it understands the political task as it does... Theologically, the challenge of Christian social ethics in our secular polity is no different than in any time or place - it is always the Christian social task to form a society that is built on truth rather than fear. For the Christian, therefore, the church is always the primary polity through which we gain the experience to negotiate and make positive contributions to whatever society in which we may find ourselves.

truth, language, and the RCL

As I was reading a book about words, I came across some ideas that have shaped my understanding of language as a vehicle for truth. If the author (Jacques Ellul) is correct, then scripture needs to be read aloud and with imagination in order for it to properly convey truth. Which fits in nicely with our recent move toward increased consistency in reading scripture together. Here are a few quotes - what do you think?

-----------------

One person's word against another's is the only possible fragile pointer to truth, like a compass quivering in its case... We need truth to be expressed by the most fragile agent, so that the listener remains free. The uneasiness which enables us to keep going involves knowing that we will never be able to grasp truth in its entirety, or be able to bring our adventure to a close by identifying our life with truth.

The written word is just a mummy whose wrappings must be removed someday -- not to discover a few bones, but to breathe life into it again. Only the word conveys the truth of a religious message. What the written word needs is not to be considered the source of a mere code, law, or formula, or of an indefinitely repeated prayer. It must be taken at its source and given rebirth, not by repetition, but by an inspiration that reopens it. That way the whisper can be perceived and received again. Then the word can start the listener off anew in his quest for truth.

Religious writing is filled with life only when it serves as a support and starting point for a word that is spoken, announced, or proclaimed. In this way the word becomes current and living, having left the book's pages and flown toward the listener.

Some further reading on the subject