February 21, 2005
Dear Ken:
Thank you for the opportunity to share, although I’m not eager to get involved in this discussion by email. I believe it’s best to deal with issues such as this one in deep, heartfelt one-on-one discussions, by people who have spent enough time together to get to know and trust each other. So this will probably be the longest email I’ve ever sent, because I don’t feel I can give you my opinion without letting you know more about me first, as who I am has a great deal to do with my beliefs on this issue.
Here are some things about me:
Through my personal walk with God, I am now doing what I never would have thought of doing at any point in my earlier life--I am serving a church as its pastor. My call to pastor has been confirmed for me by God, the many members of the two congregations I’ve served, and many family and friends who seemed to know even more than I did that this was the call for my life.
I am also an African American divorced female. According to traditional Biblical interpretation, I have three Biblical strikes against me that could have stopped me from serving as Pastor of the multi-cultural (predominantly Euro-American) church that I serve now. My need to know why and how the Bible could be used against this calling that I know in my heart is right for me, causes me to examine each of these challenges.
The first strike against me would have been because I am an African American. At one point in our country’s history I would not have been considered a complete human being, but something less than human, a slave. At the time our country was wrestling with whether slavery should be abolished, many good, Bible following Christians knew with all their hearts that the Bible supported and possibly required that there be slaves who were second-class citizens. Since that time, God has enlightened most of our society that slavery is wrong, and that the Bible really didn’t have to be interpreted to support slavery. We’ve gotten over it, but I can not forget it.
As a female, many good, Bible following Christians still believe that God would not call me to serve as a Pastor of a church. It might not be an overstatement to say that probably most Christians still believe that. An enlightened few have learned to read the many Biblical passages that support women in leadership roles as having authority, too. But there are many who ignore these passages and look to those passages that on face value seem to be against women serving in leadership roles as the Biblical authority on this issue. These are the passages that tradition continues to lift up as authoritative on the issue of women in leadership roles, and I can not forget that.
And as a divorced person, many good, Bible believing Christians feel very strongly that I should not hold a leadership role or office in the church. The Biblical passages that tradition has used against divorced persons must be read with an understanding of the cultural background in which the passages were formed. Jesus refused to support the divorce that Jewish tradition allowed because the simplicity of the procedure was being used by the males to oppress the females in that society. The way I understand those passages is that Jesus’ pronouncements on the issue were for the purpose of helping the oppressed females of that culture, and that while divorce is not to be encouraged, what is more important is to ensure that people are not oppressed.
Because of this background I will always question Biblical interpretations that support discrimination. Because of the strikes that traditional biblical interpretation would have imposed against me versus what God has set in my mind, I’ve had to read the Bible for understanding in a deeper and more meaningful way. Through that kind of in-depth reading, the beauty, majesty, authority and love of God comes shining through the Bible for me, and I have grown to love it even more and more. I will not give up my beloved Bible to traditionalists and fundamentalists to have the final say on what it means.
So yes, there are Biblical passages that seem to denounce homosexuality. But I know many gay people who truly love God and are kind, deep, true Christians, who are faithful in their relationships, who have gifts for leadership and who clearly have calls on their lives to pastor and lead in the Christian church. How can the Bible tell us that their sexual preferences would keep God from calling them to serve as leaders in the church?
In order to find guidance on issues such as this, I find myself leaning on what the Bible tells us about Jesus, His words and His actions more than anything else. The “doors” for understanding, the “Scriptural connections”, Ken, begin here for me.
Jesus came to help the Jewish leaders understand more clearly the laws that they had interpreted in such a way that they were oppressive to many people, people who the leaders thought they were supposed to keep out of the Kingdom. He came to help them delve deeper into the commandments, teaching people to “turn the other cheek” (we've all had a really hard time with this one), go the extra mile, give the extra coat, etc. He sums up his discussion with a key phrase for me, and that is that all of the laws are for the purpose of helping us to love each other better—to treat each other the way we want to be treated.
Jesus says to us that all the law and the prophets—all that God has taught God’s people—hang on the two highest commandments, which are to love God and to love each other. I know there are many people who believe that love includes forcing people into acceptable molds, but from experience I can tell you that it doesn’t feel like love to be told that you are not good enough to serve God, especially when God is telling you something else! When we filter our understandings of Scripture through these two highest commandments, any interpretation that lifts up and supports others, like love does, is more likely to be truer than one that does not.
Jesus’ grace is truly amazing. His grace is so amazing that He angered the synagogue when He told the people that the widow of Zaraphath and the Syrian leper received the blessings of God versus others who thought they had a right to inherit the Kingdom of God. Jesus’ grace was so amazing because He was willing to anger the Pharisees by sitting and eating with sinners and the hated tax collectors. Jesus’ grace was so amazing because He used the hated Samaritans to show how much more important love is than holding positions of authority, and He allowed unclean women to touch Him and to engage in the priestly function of anointing Him before His death. Jesus’ grace was so amazing that most of His disciples did not get it, at least before His death. We need to continue to allow Jesus to amaze us with His grace, and not try to limit it according to our limited capabilities of understanding.
I need to understand that as soon as I believe I see a speck of sawdust in someone’s eye and think I need to correct them, I have a plank in my own eye. It is not my right to judge, that’s God’s right. It’s not my right to draw the lines on who’s in or who’s out, that’s to be left up to God. I always need to be reminded that I can never fully know God’s plan for salvation.
While I have not done a full-scale in-depth study of the passages that are used to condemn homosexuals, I have read some interpretations that made me think. Here are some of the thoughts I’ve read on the subject: The sin of Sodom was not just because the men wanted to have intercourse with men, but had to do with the sexual abuses of rape and sexual excess, and there were other abuses in that city as well. Leviticus 18:22 sentences to death men who would lie with other men as with women, but Leviticus also had laws that sentenced to death people who committed adultery, children who curse their parents, and incest. There are a lot of rules that made sense to the people of that time and that were designed to keep the children of Israel together and set them apart from the other nations around them. Many of these nations were pagan, and engaged in temple prostitution and sexual excesses, including sexually abusing and sacrificing male and female children. This pagan sexual worship formed much of what is the basis for Paul’s corrections to the churches, which had more to do with keeping the pagan sexual excesses out of the church than with homosexual behavior. Jesus had nothing to say about homosexual behavior, and neither did the 10 commandments.
Finally, I need to remember that I do not have the final authority on how to interpret God’s Word—no human does. We all see through our glasses darkly. As soon as I think that I have the final and only interpretative take on the Bible, and that everyone who does not agree with me is wrong, I’m substituting my wisdom for God’s wisdom, and that makes me arrogant. Jesus and the prophets had a lot more to say against arrogance than they did about homosexuality.
I know this way of looking at things does not provide hard and fast rules like many people like to have, and that’s part of the problem. I truly believe we hurt the congregations we serve by laying on them hard and fast rules that are easy for us to pronounce, without teaching them to search for the deeper understandings that we must struggle to gain in order to see more clearly what God’s Word has to say to us today. It’s a lot easier to lay down rules than it is to teach people to care enough to wrestle with how to love each other better.
For me, the answer to the question of whether God would want us to exclude homosexuals from leadership positions in the church is that I don’t really know, but that doesn’t sound like the God that is in my experience, so I don’t think so. I do know this: that I can recognize the people who are called by God because of their love for God and their love for others; and I know who are the people of faith because they try to do their best to usher in God’s Kingdom on this earth. My experience is that some of those people happen to be homosexuals.
I don’t know why in God's created world some persons are inclined to homosexuality, but that’s not my knowledge to have. I do know that when I don’t fully understand, all I can do is lean towards love and remember Jesus’ amazing grace. If I make a mistake, I want to make the mistake based on the fact that I tried my best to be as accepting and as loving as Jesus.
Jesus told us that whoever believes in Him will have eternal life. “Whoever” includes a lot of people who are not like me.
Alice Davis
Senator-at-Large
Executive Committee
March 1, 2005
Dear Alice,
I completely agree that e-mail is a far less desirable way to discuss an issue rather than face to face. But I hope we can have some back and forth on the issues that can help clarify our thinking.
Thank you for being so personal. Let me share a bit. I retired last year from being pastor of University Baptist Church in Palm Desert for thirty four years. It never grew to be a large church, but I enjoyed the privilege of ministering. I was eight years at Cochran Ave. Baptist in Los Angeles that was in a racially changing neighborhood. By the time I left the congregation was 80% African American, and I have never been so well loved in my life. I have always believed that black and white churches have much to learn from each other. I also am charismatic since I believe in the gifts of the Spirit even though I do not speak in tongues. I refuse to let that label go to a stereotyped style. My wife, Juanita, and I have been married for almost forty eight years and have raised three daughters and have five grandchildren. Our oldest daughter was killed in an auto accident last year.
In my responses to letters I have received I try to pick out one issue and speak to it. Since Kate has put my other letters on the web site, you can check them out. One thing quickly that needs more discussion is about discrimination. Prejudice is a sin whichever direction it comes from. Is what we call a gay lifestyle a moral issue or a civil rights issue? People have the right to do many things we would consider immoral. I do not approve of people who have affairs even though it is their "right" to do so. Every company has work rules that apply while at work that do not apply outside of work. I would hope the church has higher standards than society at large.
Thank you for bringing up Biblical interpretation. I am hearing that everyone agrees that the Bible has some kind of authority over us. I tried to define the nature of that authority in my letter to Phineas Marr. If it all hinges on interpretation, then let's go there. To claim its authority without discussing its contents doesn't make sense.
One interpretative illustration you use is regarding the men of Sodom. I could give you many alternative views on eschatology, but that would get us nowhere until I give you my interpretation of the book of Revelation, for example. I have a regular experience with an Jehovah's Witness elder at my front door, and we tell each other what we believe the Bible teaches. We have fun trying to straighten each other out. I could throw a lot of scholarly stuff at him, but he needs to know what I believe. I want to speak to your possible interpretations, but I really would like to know what you believe the Bible teaches.
You suggested that the men of Sodom's wickedness was not JUST intercourse of men with men but rape and sexual excess. Does that mean that if the men/angels had come out and had consensual sex it would have been O.K.? Since rape did not happen, how did Sodom become legendary for wickedness? Jude 7 refers to them as "they who indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural lust." (NRSV) Why is this story included at this point in the narrative if not to explain the divine judgment upon Sodom and Gomorra and Lot's deliverance? That's stiff judgment for a hospitality issue as some would claim.
Further, you refer to "sexual excess" both for Sodom and Greco-Roman society. Do you mean "too much" or "the wrong kind?" Even one rape is an excess. If homosexual sex is a morality issue, then even once is too much.
Regarding Leviticus and capital punishment. Too harsh, of course. But all of those things you list we recognize as sins, unless you consider a man lying with a man as an exception. An Israelite did not separate ritual, moral and cult sacrificial commandments in the Torah. They were all from the Lord. How can we separate purity laws from moral ones? A clue would be that all cleansing issues (touching a dead body, menstruation, nocturnal emissions, even mildew in a house, etc.) could be purified by a ceremony after a proper lapsed time. But for homosexual practice, incest and beastiality the penalty was death. That's a tough way to get cleansed!
"Jesus had nothing to say about homosexual behavior." That's not surprising since Jews considered that settled by the Torah and it was not controversial. Jesus didn't say anything about slavery, either.
". . .neither did the Ten Commandments." Nor does the Amos passage on justice say anything about civil rights.
No one of us claims to speak ex cathedra on Biblical interpretation like we were the Pope. But every time we preach we preach what we believe. We rarely give several interpretations and ask the congregation to take their pick. That's teaching, not preaching. Are we being arrogant when we do this? Preaching is a proclamation and we do have a message to proclaim.
March 1, 2005
Alice,
In my rush to make an appointment I did spell check and forgot to come back with a final closure sign off and it may have come across as rude. I apologize.
In Christ,
Ken Savage
Senator from PSW
March 1, 2005
Ken,
Thank you for the apology. I actually read that before I read your response, so I didn't have a chance to feel that you were being rude. Thanks for the consideration, though.
Your response makes it clear to me that we will, in all likelihood, not be able to agree on the biblical message concerning homosexuals. But I'm willing to stay in fellowship and in the ABC family with you and others who agree with you. So, it seems to me that the only real question at this point is whether you are willing to stay in the family with me. Are you?
Alice Davis
Senator-at-Large
Executive Committee
March 8, 2005
Dear Alice.
I sense from your letter that you want to bow out of the dialogue and that's disappointing. To me a dialogue is not a one launch missile but a back and forth on the issues raised. As I said, I attempted to speak to only one of the many issues you raised, that of Biblical interpretation.
I felt you opened the door for that, but your letter seemed to close it rather quickly. I agree with you on many of the points you made, and maybe I should affirm that in order to establish the trust you speak of. I feel that to come to a decision on such a defining issue is like being on a jury and trying to sort through the conflicting testimony and even
that of expert witnesses to a decision which is hard work and painful. But the decision is not made without hearing and evaluating the testimony.
My decision as to whether I can remain in fellowship with those who affirm gay identity and practices will depend on what decision we will come to and how we arrive at it. To me, there are many dots to be connected. I said in my original letter that we all must not only state our beliefs but examine our assumptions. Before we can do that we must
acknowledge them, and I think I am willing to do that. But that cuts both ways.
When a couple comes for marriage counselling they often dump all the issues between them on the table. Any issue leads to all the others, but you would usually start with the stated problem. The stated problem in our case is of implied approval by seating a senator who has a publicly declared homosexual marriage. Since there was no by law reason to act,
it seemed appropriate to correct that. If we have no Biblical authority to help us, there is no reason to discuss what the Bible teaches. If there is Biblical authority, and everyone seems to say there is, then we need to look at the text and come to some conclusion. (1) Does the Bible condemn homosexual practices? (2) If not, then does it leave a open door for their approval? (3) Can a case be built from Scripture for the honoring of a homosexual marriage? At some point we must address whether homosexuality is an orientation or an identity and
is this all pre natal or is there a spectrum of causes? And finally, what is our Baptist heritage and polity and does it allow boundaries of any kind for belief and practice? If there are no boundaries, discussion is futile.
We are all sinners and at different times in our lives we have a particular "besetting sin" which must be dealt with. I am sure you know homosexuals who know and love the Lord. I know alcoholics that I say the same thing about. But they do not celebrate their alcoholism. They rejoice that their "higher power" is giving them strength to overcome one
day at a time. That's the difference.
I agree with your emphasis on God's grace which is always the basis of our relationship to him. I look at grace and rules in a developmental way. Parents love for their children is free and unconditional. But the love that leads to freedom imposes structure in a context of love. Have you watched the T.V. series, "Supernanny?" This English woman comes into
a chaotic household and imposes rules so that parents can gain control over their uncontrolled children. She has the parents get down to eye level and tell the child in a firm voice, "That is unacceptable," and after an appropriate time out accepts an apology and gives a hug. I picture God doing that. As we submit to his authority by showing our love by obeying what he tells us to do, we find immense freedom in our surrender to him. The rules on Supernanny are at first felt as oppressive by the children and often by the uninvolved father, but in fact they are the way to liberation for the whole family. In the Scripture, it is the Son who sets us free to walk in the Spirit and not according to the flesh.
I welcome any response.
In Christ,
Ken Savage
Senator from PSW
March 22, 2005
Hi Kenneth,
I apologize for the delay in responding, but I took some much needed time off to meet and spend time with my new grandson and family.
I'm sorry if my rather terse response led you to believe that I did not want to continue discussions with you. That was not my point at all. All of the things you point out can certainly be discussed, and already have been discussed over and over. This is not a new issue. The issue will turn for many on whether they believe that homosexuality is inherent or a choice, whether the practice of homosexuality impairs one's ability to function (like alcoholism does), on what parts of the Bible they feel are "authoritative", on whether they read the Bible with context, history and with the present in mind, on how they understand Jesus' teachings on unconditional grace and love, on the people they know who are gay, and on myraid other issues.
My point to you is that I do not believe that even if we can come to agreement on some of these issues that we will agree on what should be the outcome. And even if you and I can reach an agreement, which I always hold out as a possibility, there will still be others who will disagree. And so it goes on, as it has on the many other issues believed to be crucial for determining who are the righteous who deserve to be in God's family.
While we're spending our very precious time dealing with this issue, there is Good News that needs to be delivered to the world around us, there is a world out there that needs to know more about Jesus and His love, there are people who need saving, there are communities that need to be re-energized with hope and love, there is much work to be done because the harvest is plentiful and the workers are few.....
So while we continue in these discussions, the more pressing issue for me is how do we live and continue our work together in our ABC family in the meantime?
If I may infer from your response on this issue, it seems to me that you will only agree to stay with the ABC family if the majority of the ABC members vote to keep out those who you feel should be kept out, i.e., if you are on the "winning" side. I suggest that we need not focus on who wins or loses on this issue, but how do we live together with the disagreements that we will surely have, no matter how long we discuss it.
I look forward to hearing back from you. Have a joyous Resurrection Sunday celebration.
Yours in Christ,
Alice Davis
Senator-at-Large
Executive Committee
April 6, 2005
Alice,
Sorry for the delay in my response to your letter. We had a week away sitting our grandson. Thank you for continuing the discussion.
Rather than respond point by point over issues I have already commented on in my exchanges with others that are (or will be) posted on the web site, let me try to analyze where we are as American Baptists and the nature of unity we might achieve. This is an attempt, and I wish others would make the same effort.
Let's go to the setting of the Enlightenment. Knowledge via science was challenging long held beliefs grounded in theology and backed up by a theocratic view of church and state which had led to the Crusades and the Inquisition. Galileo's conflict was an example. From reason and science as a new authority there developed a new faith in progress if only religious authority could be bypassed. A world view of naturalism developed that led to radical Biblical criticism (eg. Strauss) that ended the possibility of any divine intervention commonly called miracles.
On one level the response was Deism that posited a Creator who left everything to natural laws that science was to discover. Another response was from Schleiermacher, who has been called the "father of liberalism," who focused on religious experience as an unshakable reality. What was experienced could be verified if the supernatural couldn't. An example was that William James, the pragmatist, could write about the Varieties of Religious Experience and discuss the results of revivalism and mysticism regardless of the "truth" behind either.
The liberal theological tradition has followed this track. For example, the emphasis on "spirituality" as an experience anyone can have apart from content has been reflected in recent American Baptist publications. Dr. Medley was in this tradition whether he realized it or not in his Richmond sermon where he said that it is the Holy Spirit who will bring us together. But the Holy Spirit cannot be separated from the Word which he inspired. (1 Peter 1:21) At Pentecost it was the reality of the Resurrection that led to their conviction by the Spirit. And the message outlined by Peter and used throughout Acts and summarized by Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:1-3 is the core message from which Christian spiritual experience develops. It was E. Stanley Jones who said that the gospel is not complete without Pentecost, that is receiving the Spirit of Christ by faith and repentance.
For me I see a dividing line here that is fuzzied by the fact that we use the same language to mean different things. It goes back to the inheritance of two different world views. If experience is determinative, it can come from any source and culture decides what it will be. But if the reality behind the gospel is determinative, then there is a reality apart from culture that any culture will have to respond to. Christ then becomes the judge and renewer of all cultures. Lamin Sanneh (Yale Divinity School) credits Bible translation in to indigenous languages with the explosion of Christianity in Africa. This is the opposite of popular impressions that Christianity squelches such cultures.
Once culture determines both truth and morality you are in the slide that Paul describes in Romans 1. Following Richard's Niebuhr's Christ and Culture, is Christ the bearer of culture as in the state churches, or in tension with culture as in the non conformist churches? I suggest our Baptist heritage is the latter. Where do we draw the line that puts us in this tension? Both sides of the issue seem to agree that the fault line is over the issue of homosexual practice (not the orientation). This is not just an American Baptist issue. If this is not where the line is to be drawn that puts us in tension with society, where then is it?
The pattern of God's working in the scripture is to choose a person or people to be his agent to the rest of the world. He chose Abraham and his descendants to be a light to the nations. Jesus did not just relate to everyone in love as some seem to claim, but he "came to his own," the Jewish people. There is no record of a ministry in Tiberias, a Roman city right there in Galilee. He chose twelve to be with him, and turned back several volunteers. The church began as Jewish only and Acts describes the struggle to open the door of faith to the Gentiles. And now the church has become the "chosen race" to bear the light of Christ to the nations.
The reality is that everyone's business is no one's business, and God lays special responsibility on those he has chosen.
The New Testament church had a definite identity and one became a part of that identity by baptism which came about by choice. It separated from Judaism by confessing Jesus as Messiah, and from Rome by refusing to acknowledge Caesar as Lord. Pluralism is not an identity. Unless we have an identity we have nothing to contribute to pluralism. Paul Tournier said there are two movements. The first is to develop a self, and the second is to give our self away. If we don't have a self, we can't give it away. We do not make our mark by showing how much freedom we have. We influence society by standing for something that is different from society at large and its culture. I propose that it be that we have a faith in Christ that is built upon the foundation of Apostolic Christianity as deposited in the canonical books of the New Testament. Unless we have this or some other anchor yet to be named, we are subject to the vagaries of whatever cultural norms blow our way.
Let me be more specific. I believe the position I have tried to describe is where the vast majority of American Baptists are. Some will say it is too narrow and others too broad. The issue is not to kick anyone out, but to stake an identity and let us all freely choose. The irony is that if anyone can be anything he chooses and this is the identity over against Apostolic Christianity, then many will make their choice because that is not their identity. I hope there is a better choice than that.
I do not know what will happen at the Denver Biennial. I am sure a lot of unhappiness will be expressed. I still say that the Ministers Council decision about the by law change will be taken as a bellwether by many. Its rejection will be taken by many that the issue is closed and that would be the proof. That would be sad.
In Christ,
Ken Savage
Senator from PSW
April 7, 2005
Dear Ken,
Thank you for making my point. You said: "We influence society by standing for something that is different from society at large and its culture. I propose that it be that we have a faith in Christ that is built upon the foundation of Apostolic Christianity as deposited in the canonical books of the New Testament." I agree with you on this and on many other points. Where we differ is who gets to make the final determination on what is the "Apostolic Christianity as deposited in the canonical books of the New Testament." Your assumption is that you have the only "correct" belief of what that is, and that is the problem. It is a problem that has existed throughout the history and traditions of the Church.
There are some who say that true "Apostolic Christianity" can only be lived out in the Catholic Church, meaning you and me, to name a couple, are out.
There are some who say that true "Apostolic Christianity" only exists in those who are able to exorcise demons, pick up snakes and survive their deadly poisons and lay on healing hands, meaning I'm out. Does that leave you out, too?
There are some who say that true "Apostolic Christianity" only exists in those who can speak in tongues. I've done that. But if I recall correctly, you said that you haven't.
You get my point. I agree a part of the core message of the gospel is that Christ died for our sins. But if you accept that core message without allowing the teachings of Christ to move your heart, you are missing the whole point of why Jesus came. It wasn't so that you and I could determine who are the sinners and who are not. The core message of the gospel includes the two highest commandments that Christ came to give us on how to govern our lives according to His teachings, to love God and to love each other. Those teachings are real clear on who has the right to judge and who doesn't. So in addition to the 1 Corinthians text you cited, we must also understand Matthew 7:1-5 and 7:12 and other teachings of Christ as a part of the core message of the gospel.
I agree wholeheartedly that Christians must stand against society. If we don't we can't be the "salt" and "light" of the world that Christ calls us to be. But I draw the line differently than you draw it. I believe with all my heart, well-educated mind and soul, that Christ is much more concerned about how we stand up in society against those things that are anti-love---abuse, poverty, famine, disease, hate, greed, etc. If we don't stand up against the abusive powers of this world, we'll find ourselves like the church in Germany that did not stand up against HItler, or the church here in the United States that allowed the abuses of the Native Americans and Africans. History will stand to repeat itself if we don't focus on the love of God as the governing force of our faith.
Those things that are anti-love are the evils that we need to stand up against, and when we spend all our time focusing on who's in and who's out, we're not doing God's will, but exercising our own predilections to force our will on others. I'm back to arrogance again. Yes, we are to encourage each other to live our lives soberly and without excesses that reflect negatively and hypocritically on our faith. Those excesses include arrogance, among other things.
So in response to all that you have said, let me take you back to my first letter. It says all that I need to say on this.
Yes, the bienniel and the Ministers Council Senate meetings will tell us a lot about who we are as God's children. I am praying that we will be able to deal with our differences in love, with care for each other that is reflective of the Christ who we serve. What are you praying for?
Peace,
Alice Davis
Senator-at-Large
Executive Committee
April 26, 2005
Dear Alice,
Our exchanges are an example of how unclear we are in what we are trying to say and I hope we can get beyond stereotyping each other's position.
You claim that the problem is that I assume that my position is the only one consistent with the Apostolic foundation and it is arrogant of me to do so. May I suggest that sounds like a beam you are trying to remove from my eye? Let me try to refine my assumption from your over simplification. Since I believe in Biblical authority it is very important to understand in the best way I can what it teaches. Since it is a complex set of writings I need to seek the unity amid its complexity. Since the incarnation only happened once in a particular setting, if its message is to be transposed to our day then I need to understand the situation in which the events happened. I assume that, since these writings were chosen to represent the deposit of Apostolic teaching and life, every part of the canon is there for a purpose to add
to or balance out some need or understanding in the early church. If this is true then all the parts must fit together and I cannot just dismiss anything because I don't like it. The longer we live with the Bible and the more we try to understand the message of each writer in his
setting the more we appreciate its integrated wholeness and recognize those themes that tie it together. In this process I recognize a great diversity of interpretation. I have changed my interpretation of numerous passages as new evidence is presented. But when I do it is because someone has given me more and better evidence to consider. Is it arrogant to consider my interpretation the best I have come across until now? In your first letter you suggested an interpretation of the Genesis passage on Sodom and I suggested why I could not buy into that. You didn't come back to defend an interpretation which I suspect is not really yours. If we claim Biblical authority then it is my assumption that we must then discuss what we believe the Bible teaches or the claim to authority evaporates.
All illustrations are imperfect, but I like to compare my Biblical position to a rocket in four stages sent off on a heavenly mission. The launch and first stage establishes its basic trajectory and each stage gives it new momentum with refined guidance toward its goal. It will pass through gravity fields that could change its course and must be adjusted accordingly. God launched his purposes with Israel. Jesus as Messiah was a new stage, but it continued the trajectory (we as Christians believe but Jews do not) established in the O.T. Pentecost began the third stage built upon the rejection and resurrection of Jesus with new momentum in the coming of the Holy Spirit. The fourth stage is the church beyond the Apostolic age which still makes course corrections based on the original trajectory, but each must be based on the previous. If you don't understand stage three you can't adjust the course in stage four. Further, the gravity fields of tradition, the spirit of each age and internal heresies must be adjusted to. This illustration is why I keep using the term "trajectory" as a metaphor for our connection with the past.
You mention various groups. The point is to decide where they are on the Apostolic foundation and where they are off. This can only be done in relation to Scripture that defines that foundation. I would point out to Catholics that "You are Peter and on this rock I will build my church" does not teach Apostolic succession. I would point out to Pentecostals that Acts 2:4 does not teach that we must have a tongues experience to be baptized with the Holy Spirit. I would try to persuade snake handlers that in the best manuscripts Mark ended with 16:8 and that verse 18 may refer to what actually happened with Paul. "You shall not put the Lord to the test" was what Jesus himself announced. Do snake handlers also drink poison? I do not speak in tongues and Scripture says that not all do, but it is a spiritual gift for some. I believe in the gift of healing but do not believe Bennie Hinn exemplifies that gift. I believe there are rare cases of demonic exorcism. (See Scott Peck's "People of the Lie.") I am open to consider that homosexual practices are consistent with Scriptural teaching if someone will explain it to me from Scripture or that it is the Scriptural trajectory. The abolition of slavery and the recognition of women are in the trajectory of Scripture in my judgment.
If you ever served on a jury you will know that the judge asks if you can withhold a decision until you have heard all of the evidence, and if you can make your decision on the evidence that he has allowed to be presented. The system assumes that persons of average intelligence can hear contrary evidence and come to a good decision. They could be wrong, but does their making a decision make them arrogant? Rather than not make decisions, I believe we are challenged to make decisions based on the evidence presented. To withhold Biblical interpretaion from the decision process is an arbitrary thing to do.
You asked me to consider Matthew 7;1-5, 12. I have. I am not sure what point you are trying to make. If it is that we are not to make judgments, that is not what the passage says. According to the golden rule, what if we want others to take the painful speck out of our eye? In seminary our dorm agreed that we would correct each other if we used bad grammar for the sake of our future ministry. I had several grammatical specks that happily were removed. If you agree that there is a unity to the Bible, how do you interpret Jesus' word to Peter about binding and loosing? The same Jesus who gave us Matthew 7:1-5 also gave us that.
Regarding what is the core message, the gospel is good news. A command to love is not good news unless it is applied to someone else with me being the recipient. I am convicted by it because I may never love enough to be assured of my salvation. Paul outlines the gospel in 1 Corinthians 15:1-3 which is the same outline Peter preached at Pentecost and Paul at Pisidian Antioch. The gospel created the church and the church preserved the gospel by adopting the canon of Scripture. C. H. Dodd distinguished the outline of the gospel, the kerigma, from the teachings of Christ, the didache, which was used to instruct new converts. You have to have a convert before he can be instructed. Based on the unity of the Bible, how do you correlate the core teaching of love with Paul's whole message in Romans that we are justified by faith in Christ? If we are to understand each other, these are the kind of things we need to discuss.
What am I praying for? I will say "amen" to your prayer that we "deal with our differences in love" with some added comments. The key word is "differences." It is not loving just to slide over our differences as though they don't matter. If I told you as an African American woman that you have your interpretation of the slavery experience and I have mine, so let's not discuss it since we might not be able to handle that, is that the loving response? I think not. I do not take the resistance to discuss Biblical interpretations as loving. You may not feel that it matters, but if it matters to me, then it matters. Real love kicks in when our differences are acknowledged.
My prayer, and I'm not sure I really have the faith to pray for this, is that in our American Baptist denomination those of liberal heritage and those of us from an evangelical heritage would do the necessary work to seek a unity based on theology that would be different than just considering ourselves a plural denomination. I believe this is as great a problem as racial unity. Many high schools, for example, have integrated but the races are just as separate as ever. What advantage is it to be under one organization if we are not more united than we are presently? Why can't our denominational leadership pursue this as a goal just as hard as they have pursued social justice? Rodney King's plaintive question applies, "Why can't we just get along?" This expresses the problem but does not give an answer. We may have been in denial over this for too long already. It may be too late. My prayer is that it isn't.
In Christ,
Ken Savage
Senator from PSW
May 13, 2005
Hello Ken,
I said in my last email to you that I did not desire to respond anymore because I was feeling that these conversations were not serving any useful purpose. A few days ago, I received from Kate Harvey a copy of your response to Jimmy Reader's last letter, and now I feel like there is "fire shut up in my bones" that I need to share. So I hope you will indulge me by allowing me to share what I plan to be my last time in this conversation.
We live in a postmodern world. The term "postmodern" is a way of trying to explain what is happening in the world around us now. Postmodern philosophy and theology reflect our present reality in these two different arenas. I don't believe our differences are so much explained by our worldviews--which I'm defining as how we see the world--as they are explained by our differing views of how God wants us to operate in the world as it exists--our different theological perspectives. Ken, I think you and I agree that as Christians we are called out to make a real difference in this world, but we disagree on what that means. That disagreement is not driven by our worldviews, but by our understandings of what God expects of us.
This takes me back to your next to last email to me, where you talked about your Biblical understandings of trajectories. I must say, this is an approach that smacks of "process theology" not expected from one who disdains postmodern theological approaches. I connected with your metaphor, as it attempts to capture the direction God is leading us through God's revelations to us as Jesus, through the Word and the Holy Spirit.
But I see the trajectory process differently than you. What I see at stage two of your metaphor is that a great trajectory correction was needed and was made by Jesus. When Jesus came, he spent much of his time trying to correct the faulty understandings of the Pharisees and other leaders. His first sermon after he came out of the wilderness, Luke tells us, caused a great commotion because he said God's promises would not necessarily be for all those who claimed the promise, giving as examples the two non-Israelites, the widow of Zarephath and Naaman the Syrian. He focused much time on the leaders' misapplications of the commandments in his sermons on the mount and on the plain. Jesus constantly confounded not only the religious leaders but also his disciples, by sharing the good news and his blessings with those whom they thought were not supposed to receive them, and by associating with those whom their worldview considered unclean.
The biblical witness of Jesus tells us that Jesus was out to make a course correction. As you put it, the "gravity field" of miscomprehension had slowed down the process of sharing God with the whole world, as God intended.
One example of how these corrections took place even in the earliest church became clear to me at the Jerusalem Council process here in Metro Chicago. We were reading the text in Acts 15 when it became very clear to me and the group there that the early church leaders were wrestling with a question of biblical interpretation of huge importance. Circumsion was not just basic to their beliefs of what was required for a man to be a member of their religious group, but it was written in Scripture as a commandment from God (Genesis 17:9-14).
So the Jerusalem Council's decision to not require circumcision of the gentile believers was a tremendous paradigm shift. But here is the important thing for us today: this decision was not made because they no longer saw themselves as Jews. The decision, Scripture tells us, was based on the evidence provided by the Holy Spirit and their own discussion of the matter. See verse 28: "It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us....." The evidence of the movement of the Holy Spirit was seen in the pouring out of the Holy Spirit on the gentiles who accepted Christ (Acts 10:45-48). This was a revelation to Peter and the other disciples that occurred because of the relationships they formed when the disciples shared the Good News with a group of people whom they had originally believed were not to be in the kingdom.
I don't know if you know any practicing homosexuals who are Christians personally, Ken. I do. And I know they believe in God, they love the Lord and they are filled with the power of love and caring that only comes from the Holy Spirit. I have felt the power of the Spirit as they pray. I have seen the Holy Spirit at work in people, who in an earlier time in my life, I would have not thought fit for the Kingdom. But I also remembered my own history, and those who would have thought the same of me. And I know that the Holy Spirit is telling us that it is time for us to stop trying to stem what the Holy Spirit is surely doing. Another witness to this is the number of women, people of color and people with different sexual preferences who are flocking to the seminaries--that is the power of the Holy Spirit, signaling us that God is doing a new thing that will not be stopped by any human.
This is the trajectory towards more inclusiveness that Jesus signaled in his sojourn on earth. It was more inclusiveness than the religious leaders were comfortable with. The trajectory was again slowed down by later leaders of the early church, who in their effort to grow the church in a male-oriented, slave owning society began to make the church look more like the world. But since the trajectory towards more inclusiveness is God's plan, it is slowly but surely pulling against those gravity fields of tradition towards the inclusiveness that God intends for us all.
I also believe it is the new thing that God is doing because of where the world is now. The message of Christ is for all people, and there are many good people who are waiting to hear a fresh Word from God. They are postmodern people, who respect the differences of others and do not believe that everyone must act and be the same. They are people who know and love people whom the church says are not acceptable to God, and they are confused and turned off from the church because of it. They are people who are a part of the harvest that God intends to have in the kingdom, and God's will in this respect will not be stopped.
The things you list as being "often a part of the gay community": promiscuity, group sex, etc., is a misconception that many who are homophobic use to justify their own inclinations. Promiscuity, group sex and sexual abuse are often a part of the heterosexual community as well.
But I do want to assure you that there are lines to be drawn about what is acceptable and what is not acceptable behavior. There are some very strong standards that must be kept by those who want to enter into the Kingdom of God. Jesus gives them to us. Love, not hate. Love means building up, not breaking down. Encouragement and support, not abuse. If you want to know where to place the standards for correcting each other, look at 1 Corinthians 13. Any sexual practice that is abusive, whether it is in a heterosexual relationship or a homosexual relationship is abhorrent.
I think this is where the postmodern world is leading us: To new paradigms on what it really means to love one another. It does not mean that we should all look alike, act alike or think alike. We do not all have to follow one culture's set of rules and regulations. What we have to do is to love each other in spite of our differences. And that can only be done through the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
Thanks for your indulgence, and thank you also for making me to think more specifically and concretely about this issue. I've convinced myself, if I convince no one else, that I'm on the right side of this dispute.
Blessings,
Alice Davis
Senator-at-Large
May 28, 2005
Dear Alice,
It was good to hear from you again. It's especially good to hear from a Jeremiah with fire in her bones. Just steer clear of the pit full of mud. During the past three weeks both my wife and computer have been in the hospital--not the same one. Juanita broke her ankle and will not be able to put weight on it for another month. That cramps her style and mine too. The computer doc couldn't explain why my e-mail went kaput and lost all my Inbox. He said that they just do that. Does original sin apply to computers? I appreciate it that you developed a Biblically based interpretation for accepting gays into the church. Most of what I have heard has been that the Bible doesn't really condemn gay practices even though it appears to do so.
Let me needle you just a bit. In your earlier letter you felt uncomfortable with my certainty. Congratulations, you sound pretty certain yourself now. That's good. It doesn't seem very postmodern, however. I believe we must distinguish between absolute certainty as in mathematics (mine isn't very certain) and subjective certainty. As I examine the evidence I am maybe only 55% sure of my decision. But once made, I am emotionally committed to it, and inwardly I feel 100% To publish what you believe to be public truth and not just a private value is an act of courage, especially in these times when religion is considered to be a private value and not a public truth.
I was surprised that you linked me to process theology. I'm not that academic. The rocket metaphor came from a book by J. W. Wright, Knowing Christ Through the Old Testament. He used this to describe the covenants and especially the New Covenant. Each stage gathered new energy and pointed more precisely to God's goal, but each new thrust was based on the trajectory of those previous. I believe that God is far more in control of the process than I understand process theology allows.
A point based on this metaphor. The stage launched at Pentecost comes from the one launched by Jesus when he came proclaiming that the Kingdom of God is at hand. The trajectory begun at Pentecost is closer to the realization of God's goal than the one represented by Jesus during his ministry. We only see hints of where God is going in Jesus' earthly ministry. The inclusion of the Gentiles could not happen until the Messiah was crucified, until that stage had finished its burn. It was not Jesus' teaching of love that made him unique. Jewish authors in claiming Jesus as a Jew point out that he didn't teach anything that is not paralleled in other Jewish teachings. It was his act of love for our redemption that was the special revelation of God's love (1 John 4:10). It is only in Christ that there is neither Jew nor Greek, male nor female, slave nor free. It is not in ethnicity, politics, culture, social class, gender, educational level or nationality. Jesus' teaching that we are to love God and neighbor is not the gospel. As important as that is, it had already been said. A command cannot be good news. The good news is that there is no condemnation to those who are in Christ. This is the inclusiveness that is extended to all. Are we saying the same thing?
Let me try to give a brief interpretation. The glorious promises of the prophets were not fulfilled after the return from captivity. A real puzzle. Finally they gained independence after the Maccabees's victories, but the results were even more corruption than the gentiles would bring. The Pharisees arose believing that the reason the Messiah had not come was because the Torah was not being perfectly kept, and they set themselves to doing that. How do you keep the Sabbath perfectly, and how do you sustain a kosher household? It is outsiders who mess things up, and so religion becomes more and more introverted. How, then, can you be a light to the nations? Jesus' announcement of the kingdom was to all who had ears to hear, the "people of the land" who were not strictly observant and therefore "sinners" in the eyes of the Pharisees. Jesus clashed with their basic premise, so how could he be the Messiah? To recognize him as the expected king, they had to see a different kind of kingdom. Jesus told Nicodemus that you cannot see this kingdom apart from a spiritual rebirth, and this took special spiritual revelation even for Peter and the disciples. (Matt. 16:17) The people of the land who were attracted to him because of his miracles deserted him because he was not their kind of king. (John 6:14,15) At Pentecost and beyond they were given a second chance based on the apostolic witness to the resurrection. At Acts 10 (and 15) the Gentiles are now included in the invitation to respond. All who respond in faith and repentance are now included. This is the inclusiveness of the New Testament.
Jesus as a faithful Jew attended synagogue regularly. (Luke 4:16,. . ."as his custom was") His contact with those considered unclean and "sinners" happened as he lived his life and pursued his ministry. The person I like most in my service club is a recovering alcoholic with not high moral standards in some areas of his life. We have had some heavy discussions, and I pray for him regularly. He and others like him would be wholly welcomed at church. To become a member with his lifestyle would be another question.
Regarding your homosexual friends who are enthusiastic about their faith and speak in tongues. I asked a friend who pastors a charismatic American Baptist congregation and is so himself as to his viewpoint on a practicing gay who speaks in tongues. His answer was that it would be like any other disobedient Christian who speaks in tongues. He said that the gift of tongues does not guarantee a level of sanctification.
A comment about your interpretation. You speak of homosexual practices as being perceived as uncleanness, not as sin. I take that to mean that you believe the holiness code of Leviticus only deals with ritual uncleanness. But in that code is listed sacrificing children to Molech (20:1-5); practicing the occult (20:6,27); cursing parents (20:19): adultery (20:10): prostitution (21:9); blasphemy (24:15,16); murder (24:17) in addition to homosexual practices, various forms of incest and bestiality. Are these all simply uncleanness issues?
Let me make two observations on the Jerusalem Council process and postmodernism. I have done some reading trying to get a handle on it, but this experience has sharpened my understanding of the issues. First, a main point postmodernists make is that truth is really only an exercise of power so that the one in power decides what is truth. This backs their contention that truth is relative to who is in power. It is clear that the Jerusalem Council process was set up with postmodern presuppositions so that those who set it up control the "rules of the game." If truth is subjective, then we honor it by listening to each persons' view of truth. To try to force my truth on anyone would not be loving and accepting but similar to an act of violence. It's outside the rules to try to correct each other. Why does this apply only to religion? Science progresses when one reports the results of an experiment so that others can duplicate it and prove whether it is true or not. If they can't, it is not accepted. Even in scholarship, papers are published and subjected to critical response. But we are not supposed to do that with religious issues. Is something missing here?
Second, I really appreciated your closing paragraph when you said that our discussion has sharpened your thinking and conviction about what you believe. This has happened because we have not just accepted a one paper point of view but have challenged each other on what we said and had to think about it and give an answer. Postmodern thinking goes against this kind of challenge and response. The result is shallow thinking all the way around. I have learned that the postmodern view of dialogue is different from mine. I thought dialogue was for "iron to sharpen iron." Come to think of it, that is abrasive.
I will miss the Biennial at Denver because this was the one week we could arrange to take our five grandchildren on a cruise to Alaska. Considering Juanita's broken ankle, I will be grandfather to five teenagers that week. I need your prayers!
In Christ,
Ken Savage
Senator from PSW
P.S. If there is still fire in your bones, let me hear about it.