Summary... Wrath

The prophecy of Zephaniah may fittingly be called a treatise on the wrath of God . The dominant characteristic of this Day is that it is a Day of overflowing wrath (1:18).

Summary: The prophecy of Zephaniah clearly presents itself as a treatise on the wrath of God . The great Day of Yahweh is coming soon . On that Day , the God who has pledged himself repeatedly and in various contexts by the oath of the covenant shall devastate all who have broken the covenant . This terrible judgment is inevitable and unavoidable . The Day is coming soon .

Zephaniah ' s Day of Yahweh , in which the wrath of God was to be poured out on Judah , found expression in the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians . But the " day of wrath " is yet to come ( Rom . 2 : 5 ). This " great Day of his wrath " ( Rev . 6 : 16-17 ) is as certain to come as was the devasta- tion of Jerusalem . With eschatological finality , all who are not found by faith to be united in him shall be consumed from the face of the earth ( cf . Matt . 3 : 7 ; 1 Thess . 1 : 10 ; Rev . 11 : 18 ; 14 : 10 ; 16 : 9 ; 19 : 15 ).

COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL
O. Palmer Robertson. The Books of Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (New International Commentary on the Old Testament). (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1990). Pages 283, 287, 288.

Has the Day of Yahweh come yet?

some quotes by OPR on this question:

By this (Matthew 13) apparent allusion to Zephaniah , Jesus transfers the coming cosmic judgment described by the prophet from the devastation associated with judgment on old covenant Israel to the devastations associated with his final return . Jesus thereby indicates that the ultimate application of the prophetic threat of Zephaniah still is outstanding . The cosmic judgment that will reverse the creation is yet to come .

The finality of cosmic overthrow associated with the coming of Yahweh ' s Day in the fullest sense never came in the context of events as- sociated with the old covenant . It is not surprising , therefore , to find in the NT both passages which suggest an arrival of the Day of Yahweh in events current in NT times as well as passages looking to a future arrival of the great Day . Both of these perspectives must be kept in mind for a proper understanding of the contemporary significance of the coming of the Day . (already & not yet)

In a certain sense , the Day of Yahweh has come . But distinctive to the Day is the characteristic of finality . In a sense the Day came in association with certain events surrounding the advent of Jesus Christ . But in another sense the Day is yet to come . And as Zephaniah prophesied , it is near.
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Suffice it to say that the cosmic judgment associated with a dramatic theophany now may be understood in terms of the glorious return of Jesus Christ . On the day appointed he shall consummate all things .

COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL
O. Palmer Robertson. The Books of Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (New International Commentary on the Old Testament). (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1990).

stretching out the hand

(In Zeph 1:4 God says He'll stretch out His hand to bring judgement. Stretching out the hand means coming with more than usual power)......"The same concept appears in the NT when Christ works a miracle of healing by stretching out his hand ( Matt . 8 : 3 ; Mark 1 : 41 ; Luke 5 : 13 ). Elsewhere Jesus interprets his supernatural interventions as the work of the " finger of God " manifesting the arrival of the kingdom of God on the earth ( Luke 11 : 20 ). His interpretation of these events suggests that the " stretching forth " of his hand was probably intended not merely as a means of making physical contact but as a means of symbolizing a direct connec- tion with those ancient occasions in which God stretched out his hand in sal- vation . This gracious character of these new covenant interventions displays the extent of God ' s mercy toward the undeserving in Jesus ' day , but does not nullify the ultimate fulfillment of the judgment motif involved in this symbolism as anticipated by Zephaniah . "

COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL
O. Palmer Robertson. The Books of Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (New International Commentary on the Old Testament). (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1990). Page 262.




COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL
O. Palmer Robertson. The Books of Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (New International Commentary on the Old Testament). (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1990). Page 261.

John Piper's Outline of Zephaniah

1:1-18 announces the coming judgment upon Judah and Jerusalem                                      Verse 4, "I will stretch out my hand against Judah, and against all the inhabitants of Jerusalem." 

2:1-3 calls the nation back to God, and specifically (as it says in verse 3) to "seek righteousness and seek humility." 

2:4-15 Zephaniah announces the judgment that is also coming on the lands that surround Judah: the Philistines to the east (vv. 4–7), Moab and Ammon to the west (vv. 8–11), the Ethiopians to the south (v. 12), and Assyria to the north (vv. 13–15). 

3:1-7 Here Zephaniah turns his attention to Jerusalem again and lengthens the catalogue of God's accusations against her. 

3:8-20 proclaims the conversion of the peoples (v. 9), the conversion and re-gathering of Israel (v. 10), and the glorious future of all the godly as God rejoices over them with gladness. 

Zephaniah 1

Some excerpts from O Palmer Robertson's commentary on Zephaniah, which is the 1st book i've ever purchased as digital media from amazon.

The description of Josiah ' s reforms in the book of Kings appears as something of a blitzkrieg . But even if his major policies were instituted in a relatively short period of time , he still would have needed the strong support- ing confirmation of a contemporary word from the Lord to make his policies even remotely acceptable to the public . Very possibly this supporting word came from Zephaniah the prophet . Incorporating into his message the very phrases of the recently discovered book of the covenant , he addressed the people as God ' s contemporary mouthpiece , applying God ' s ancient word to the current situation . So it may be proposed that Zephaniah prophesied in the days of Josiah , and more specifically in the days immediately following the dis- covery of the book of the covenant approximately in 622 B . C .
COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL
O. Palmer Robertson. The Books of Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (New International Commentary on the Old Testament). (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1990). Page 256.

It is a sign of the persistence of God ' s grace in redeeming a people to himself to note that Amon, Josiah , and Josiah ' s son Jehoiachin are mentioned in the genealogy of Jesus Christ , the ultimate successor to the throne of David ( Matt . 1 : 10-11 ). Despite many perils and many failings on the part of God ' s people , the purposes of God could not be thwarted .
COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL
O. Palmer Robertson. The Books of Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (New International Commentary on the Old Testament). (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1990). Page 257.

Beasts, birds, and fish, representative of the whole of creation, have become for humanity an occasion of stumbling. Because of his wickedness, humanity has twisted the good things of creation into a cause for sin.
COPYRIGHTED MATERIAL
O. Palmer Robertson. The Books of Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (New International Commentary on the Old Testament). (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1990). Page 259.

Sam Storms on Saving & Common Grace

All Christians know that divine grace is the unmerited favor and mercy of God that saves sinners from a well-deserved eternal death, but few have given thought to the concept of common grace.

What theologians typically refer to as special grace is the favor of God that actually results in the salvation of the human soul. Special grace is the work of the Holy Spirit in calling, regenerating, justifying, and sanctifying individual sinners. Special grace is restricted to those who actually come to saving faith in Jesus Christ. Herman Bavinck defined the special or saving grace of God as "his voluntary, unrestrained, unmerited favor toward guilty sinners, granting them justification and life instead of the penalty of death, which they deserved" (208). Louis Berkhof defined it simply as "the free bestowal of kindness on one who has no claim to it" (71). J. I. Packer expressed it this way:

"The grace of God is love freely shown towards guilty sinners, contrary to their merit and indeed in defiance of their demerit. It is God showing goodness to persons who deserve only severity, and had no reason to expect anything but severity" (Knowing God, 120).

But this is not the only manifestation of God's grace to a sinful world. Even those who never come to saving faith in Jesus Christ are recipients of divine grace. Consider the fact that the apostle Paul (among others in Scripture) portrays the universal condition of humanity in extremely bleak language. Drawing upon the testimony of the Old Testament, he writes: "There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one" (Rom. 3:10-12). Such is the predicament of people apart from Christ. Theologians call it total depravity. But, as John Murray has observed, this apostolic assessment of human nature forces us to deal with a series of very insistent questions:

"How is it that men who still lie under the wrath and curse of God and are heirs of hell enjoy so many good gifts at the hand of God? How is it that men who are not savingly renewed by the Spirit of God nevertheless exhibit so many qualities, gifts and accomplishments that promote the preservation, temporal happiness, cultural progress, social and economic improvement of themselves and of others? How is it that races and peoples that have been apparently untouched by the redemptive and regenerative influences of the gospel contribute so much to what we call human civilization? To put the question most comprehensively: how is it that this sin-cursed world enjoys so much favour and kindness at the hand of its holy and ever-blessed Creator?" (Collected Works, II:93).

The answer to these questions is found in the distinction the Bible draws between God's common, or non-saving, grace and his special, or saving, grace. [By the way, although the Bible never uses the terms "common" or "special" when describing God's gracious activity, the latter cannot be properly understood apart from drawing this conceptual distinction.]

The common grace of God has been variously defined. According to Charles Hodge, the Bible teaches that

"the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of truth, of holiness, and of life in all its forms, is present with every human mind, enforcing truth, restraining from evil, exciting to good, and imparting wisdom or strength, when, where, and in what measure seemeth to Him good. . . . This is what in theology is called common grace" (II:667).

Abraham Kuyper defines common grace as

"'that act of God by which negatively He curbs the operations of Satan, death, and sin, and by which positively He creates an intermediate state for this cosmos, as well as for our human race, which is and continues to be deeply and radically sinful, but in which sin cannot work out its end" (279).

A simpler and more direct definition of common grace is given by John Murray, Common grace, he writes, "is every favour of whatever kind or degree, falling short of salvation, which this undeserving and sin-cursed world enjoys at the hand of God" (II:96). 

really good article by Sam Storms

John Murray, Common Grace

"The word 'common' in the title of the topic is not used in the sense that each particular favour is given to all without discrimination or distinction but rather in the sense that favours of varying kinds and degrees are bestowed upon this sin-cursed world, favours real in their character as expressions of the divine goodness but which are not in themselves and of themselves saving in their nature and effect. So the term 'common grace' should rather be defined as every favour of whatever kind or degree, falling short of salvation, which this undeserving and sin-cursed world enjoys at the hand of God." 

Kuyper Quote, Wow

. . . the unbelieving world excels in many things. Precious treasures have
come down to us from the old heathen civilization. In Plato you find
pages which you devour. Cicero fascinates you and bears you along by
his noble tone and stirs up in you holy sentiments. And if you consider
your own surroundings, that which is reported to you, and that which
you derive from the studies and literary productions of professed infidels,
how much more there is which attracts you, with which you sympathize
and which you admire. It is not exclusively the spark of genius or the
splendor of talent which excites your pleasure in the words and actions
of unbelievers, but it is often their beauty of character, their zeal, their
devotion, their love, their candor, their faithfulness and their sense of
Christianity, Culture, and Common Grace honesty. 

Yea, we may not pass it over in silence, not infrequently you
entertain the desire that certain believers might have more of the
attractiveness, and who among us has not himself been put to the blush
occasionally by being confronted with what is called the “virtues of the
heathen”?
 
Kuyper argues that common grace accounts for this state of affairs, which
seems to go against the grain of the doctrine of total depravity.

Jerram ruined me. I used to, during my early years following Jesus, LOVE LOVE to make fun of/hate/out-argue, etc people who were not followers of Christ. Come to think of it, you needed to be a "Reformed" follower of Christ for me to think you were wisely using the air God was giving you.

Anyway, I go to Covenant Seminary and Jerram Barrs makes me read the Bible and study the life of Jesus Christ and I find that EVERY HUMAN is an image-bearer of God......and therefore worthy of dignity and respect.

So, here I am years later and somehow, God shows me the beauty of his world through a dude that I probably have


Maybe because I love my son, who loves music and can actually play it

Michael Stipe, Humility, Bono, U2






this is it.
and we get to watch him zen out, confess, render his self transparent concerning what could otherwise be a big, bad, demonic case of bono envy. dude stops mimetic rivalry in its tracks (or at least renders it non-destructive).
i'm gonna learn to rock out too.

brief explanation of Mark's ending, from ESV study bible

Mark 16:9–20 “Longer Ending of Mark.” Some ancient manuscripts of Mark's Gospel contain these verses and others do not, which presents a puzzle for scholars who specialize in the history of such manuscripts. This longer ending is missing from various old and reliable Greek manuscripts (esp. Sinaiticus and Vaticanus), as well as numerous early Latin, Syriac, Armenian, and Georgian manuscripts. Early church fathers (e.g., Origen and Clement of Alexandria) did not appear to know of these verses. Eusebius and Jerome state that this section is missing in most manuscripts available at their time. And some manuscripts that contain vv. 9–20 indicate that older manuscripts lack the section. On the other hand, some early and many later manuscripts (such as the manuscripts known as A, C, and D) contain vv. 9–20, and many church fathers (such as Irenaeus) evidently knew of these verses. As for the verses themselves, they contain various Greek words and expressions uncommon to Mark, and there are stylistic differences as well. Many think this shows vv. 9–20 to be a later addition. In summary, vv. 9–20 should be read with caution. As in many translations, the editors of the esv have placed the section within brackets, showing their doubts as to whether it was originally part of what Mark wrote, but also recognizing its long history of acceptance by many in the church. The content of vv. 9–20 is best explained by reference to other passages in the Gospels and the rest of the NT. (Most of its content is found elsewhere, and no point of doctrine is affected by the absence or presence of vv. 9–20.) With particular reference to v. 18, there is no command to pick up serpents or to drink deadly poison; there is merely a promise of protection as found in other parts of the NT (see Acts 28:3–4; James 5:13–16).

Why NOT Mark 16:9-20

this is from Kim Riddlebarger
Before we turn to our text this morning, you have undoubtedly noticed that I am ending our study of
Mark’s Gospel at verse 8 of chapter 16. The reason for this is that the so-called “longer ending”
of Mark is very likely not canonical–that is, it is not part of the original gospel.
A sermon is not an appropriate place for a lesson in textual criticism, which is the science of determining
the original text of the various books of the New Testament, but we need to talk about this briefly. When
a gospel or epistle of the New Testament was first written, the original text of that document is called the
autograph. This is the document which we believe was given under divine inspiration. That original
autograph was then carefully copied by hand because of the need to read these letters in the churches,
scattered around the Mediterranean world and elsewhere. Professional scribes were often employed, but
over time copy errors crept in, and a later scribe who copied a manuscript already containing an error,
would quite naturally copy that error into his own manuscript. These copyist errors are called “textual
variants.” The older and better manuscripts are much more likely to be free of such errors.
While this sounds like this would undercut the authority of the New Testament–it does just the opposite.
The early church placed great emphasis upon the preaching of the biblical text, so that literally hundreds
of manuscripts were prepared and circulated everywhere Christianity spread. The problem is not a lack
of biblical manuscripts, but too many manuscripts, many of them quite early. Textual criticism seeks to
identify the earliest and best manuscripts and almost always gets us back to the original wording of the
autograph. Furthermore, in no case is any doctrine affected by these variants and in any good English
translation of the Bible, wherever there is a known textual variant it is clearly marked off as not being in
the best and earliest manuscripts. That’s the case with Mark 16:9-20.
(See the discussions in: Lane, The Gospel According to Mark, 601-605; France, The Gospel of
Mark, 685-688; Bruce M. Metzger, A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament (New York:
United Bible Societies, 1975), 122-128.)

While the longer ending of Mark first appears at some point in the fourth century, Mark’s gospel ends at
verse 8 in the best and oldest New Testament manuscripts. A number of church fathers (Clement and
Origen) who quote from Mark, never mention the longer ending and wrote as though verse 8 was the end
of the gospel. The two most famous biblical scholars of the early church (Eusebius and Jerome) were
both aware of the longer-ending, but believed that it was not in the best and earliest manuscripts available
to them. They rejected the longer-ending as a scribal addition and not part of the original text of Mark.
There are a couple of reasons why this longer ending began circulating. Mark either abruptly ended his
gospel at verse 8, or the original copy of Mark, which was written on a scroll, may have been damaged
(and the end torn off) so that the original ending was lost. Given the abrupt ending, a copyist then wrote
a summary of what happened after verse 8, and based this upon things mentioned in the other gospels.
There is also a one verse ending in some manuscripts, but it never got the support the longer ending did.
Over time, this 11 verse summary was appended to the end of the gospel, and after several hundred years
went by, it was simply included as a part of the gospel. So, our modern English versions include it, as
they should, but mark it off as not included in the best and earliest manuscripts. So it is not as though
Christian are hiding a corrupt text of the New Testament. On the contrary, textual criticism has proven
that we have at least 99% of the autographic text, and in those few places where there are any questions
(like Mark 16:9-20), the variants are included so that people can make up their own minds.
In any case, I think that the evidence is very clear that the canonical gospel ends at verse 8, and that
longer ending is highly unlikely to have been authored by Mark.


--Kim Riddlebarger

How could world-wide preaching of gospel happened in 33-70AD?

This is from Sam Storms... who is looking at a parallel passage to Mark 13... Matthew 24

Preaching of gospel to whole world
8. Worldwide preaching of the gospel (v. 14)
How could this possibly have occurred in the period 33-70 a.d.' It may at first seem strange, but “fundamental principles of interpretation lead us to bear in mind contextual clues: the time indicator (‘this generation’), the audience (the disciples who ask about the temple), the specific concern (the destruction of the temple), and the harmony of the preceding signs with the first-century experience. All of these should dispose us to seek a first-century fulfillment of this verse” (Gentry, The Great Tribulation, 44). Note two important facts:
a. The words "whole world" (NASB) are a translation of the term oikoumene, which literally means an inhabited area, a standard term at that time for the Greek world, then for the Roman empire, and subsequently for the then known world. The same Greek word is used in Luke 2:1 – “Now it came about in those days that a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that a census be taken of all the inhabited earth” (oikoumene). In Acts 11:28 we read that “one of them, named Agabus, stood up and showed by the Spirit that there was going to be a great famine throughout all the world, which also happened in the days of Claudius Caesar.” Again, in Acts 24:5, “For we have found this man (Paul) a plague, a creator of dissension among all the Jews throughout the world, and a ringleader of the sect of the Nazarenes.” As Gentry notes, “a surface reading of these texts suggests global events. Yet we know these ‘world’ events happen within the Roman empire of the first century” (44). The reference to the "nations" also indicates that the point is not that every geographical area on the globe must be covered but that all the nations, i.e., Gentiles, must be reached. Did this occur? This leads to the second point.
b. Writing before the fall of Jerusalem in 70 a.d., Paul says to the Colossians:
" . . . the word of truth, the gospel, which has come to you, just as in all the world also it is constantly bearing fruit and increasing, even as it has been doing in you also since the day you heard of it and understood the grace of God in truth" (1:5b-6).
Again, Paul refers to the gospel
" . . . that you have heard, which was proclaimed in all creation under heaven, and of which I, Paul, was made a minister" (1:23).
"First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, because your faith is being proclaimed throughout the whole world" (Romans 1:8; cf. 10:18).
Thus, prior to 70 a.d. the inhabited earth had indeed heard the gospel, precisely in fulfillment of Jesus’ prophecy in Matthew 24.

See the discussion in Lane to the effect that this period of time may indeed be more than a
single week, perhaps a period as long as six months. Lane, The Gospel According to Mark, 390-391.
Cranfield argues that the messianic significance of this would not have been noticed by the crowds,
despite Jesus’ deliberate actions in fulfilling prophecy. I’m not convinced. (Cf. Cranfield, The Gospel
According to Mark, 352-354).

Christ's Impact on Widows

Multi-culti widowhood

American feminists should take their complaints overseas | Andrée Seu

I would be marginalized at best, inhabiting the netherworld between normal existence and the grave. I would be shorn of my hair and denied permission to partake in family meals, would sleep on the ground, and be generally fenced from polite society by pollution taboos—if I were a widow in parts of India today.

Since widowhood is now my beat, I cock an ear to reports of how my counterparts are faring throughout the world: Like in Zambia, where, according to the locally based organization Women and Law in Southern Africa, the relatives of the deceased may help themselves to the property of the marriage, and the widow must be "purged" of her husband's spirit by having sex with a member of his family (this on a continent rife with AIDS!). Or in Zimbabwe, where law does not allow a widow to inherit from her dead husband, and where the custody of her children may be transferred to her husband's relatives. Or in Swaziland where widows are the poorest of the poor. Or Nigeria, where a widow may not work for a year after her husband's death, to prove that she has not killed him. Or in Tanzania, where widows, suspected as witches, have been stoned to death.

The Sanskrit sati literally means "a good woman" or "a true wife." The Rite of Sati, that is, the burning of a widow along with the dead husband (lest she reap the bad Karma to be born a woman again in her next reincarnation!) has been practiced since before Christ, and indeed had its practitioners in other ancient cultures as well. In the 17th century, the custom prevailed mostly in Bengal where, combined with polygamy, it now and then produced the spectacle of 40 or 50 women immolated with a single man.

Theoretically a voluntary act, Sati was in practice reduced to murder, as the widow was drugged, tied to her husband's lifeless body, and forced with bamboo sticks onto the burning pyre. Undergirding, always, has been the cultural mindset of the woman's single-minded desire to please her husband—and the husband's single-minded desire to lord over his wife!

"Desire for the husband." "Rule over the wife." Is this not an echo of Genesis 3, a demonic twist on the divinely ordained order, cosmic abnormality now become a grim normality, at least in the parts of this groaning creation where they did not say, "Blessed on the mountains are the feet of those that bring good news"? While the ship of civilization in Europe took a different, more salubrious, turn on the rudder of James 1:27 and Psalm 68:5, beginning the slow and steady reversal of the Edenic curse, elsewhere the nations languished for centuries in darkness, and called it light. (Syria's President Bashar al-Assad belongs to the Alawite branch of Muslims which, contrary to mainstream Islam, believes that women do not have souls.)

William Carey brought the true light to India (along with the printing press and medicine). But it was hijacked by Raja Ram Mohan Roy (1772-1833) who, admitting that biblical truth was "more conducive to moral principles ... than any other," was nevertheless loath to see Hinduism outflanked by Christianity, and started his own anti-sati reform movement. The Sati Abolition Act was implemented in British India in 1829. For all that, the practice has its spotty practitioners to this day, and a whole cottage industry of Sati has developed, complete with Sati temples that peddle picture prints of Ram Sati, as a woman on a burning pyre.

All this the modern feminists forget, as they decry Christianity while standing on its shoulders, impugning its record on the status of women while reaping its benefits. They would borrow its capital to discredit it; they would slay it with the very sword that it has tendered them. And such were many of us, who in our '60s journeys looked for light and liberation in all the wrong places. (My own brother, now a missionary himself, found Christ on the River Ganges where he sat reading the Baghavad-Gita, when an Indian man sidled up and handed him the Gospel of John. Ah! The depths of the riches of the mercy and humor of God!)

As long as our colleges today are crowding out the traditional humanities curriculum with such offerings as "Fetishim," "Queer Theory," and "Third Wave Feminism and Girl Culture" (actual titles), maybe we could sneak in one of our own and call it "Widowhood Through Two Millennia: The Difference Christ Has Made." We might even learn that wisdom did not spring fully formed in this generation, and we might see how much better off we are to be married, or single, or even widowed, in a culture sweetened by the gospel.

Copyright © 2009 WORLD Magazine
September 08, 2001, Vol. 16, No. 34

Lig Duncan pray for Pres. Obama

Praying for our President, Barack Obama

As Americans, I suspect that none of us can fully appreciate the far-reaching significance of this event, though our nation and much of the rest of the world are electric with the inauguration of Barack Obama as the new President of the United States of America. To say that this is historic, is a gross understatement.

Many are rejoicing at this very visible public realization of the ideals of the Declaration of Independence at the very pinnacle of our civic life. In the ascendancy of an African-American from less-than-privileged circumstances to the leadership of the free world, we see the fruit of aspirations of the Founders: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights.” You don’t have to read far in the newspapers of the world to see them marveling at yet another astounding accomplishment in the great experiment that is America.

Do you realize that our republic has now enjoyed 44 peaceful transitions of power in our two-plus centuries of existence. There is no parallel for this in human history. And we need to thank God for his singular blessing in bestowing it upon us, undeserving as we are.


But I said I wanted us to think about all this Christianly (and not just as grateful or concerned Americans, much less as giddy Democrats or grumpy Republicans!). And this presents us with some challenges, doesn't it?

As much as we may feel "this is my President and I want him to succeed," as much as we may feel sympathetic joy with millions who watched President Obama's inauguration with tear-filled eyes and hope-filled hearts, feeling themselves a part of the American story in a way they've never felt before, there lingers a question as to how to think about our leader in areas where his views and policies conflict with biblical conviction.


Many Christians find themselves profoundly conflicted because of some of the moral positions and social policies that Mr. Obama espouses. So how do you pray for your President when you disagree with him?

Thankfully, the Bible is not silent about such a question. After all it commands us to pray for all in authority (1 Timothy 2:2), no matter their party, policies or religion (or lack thereof). It is vital that we think Christianly, which is to say, biblically, about this issue (and not just as Democrats or Republicans who happen to be Christian). So, back to the question. How do we pray for Mr. Obama? Here are some ideas (and I want to thank Al Mohler and Justin Taylor for many of these thoughts and words) for praying for our new President, Barack Obama.

First, it needs to be said, that we ought to commit ourselves to pray for our new President, for his wife and family, for his administration, and for the nation. We will do this, not only because of the biblical command to pray for our rulers, but because of the second greatest commandment "Love your neighbor" and what better way to love your neighbor, than to pray for his well-being. Those with the greatest moral and political differences with the President ought to ask God to engender in them, by His Spirit, genuine neighbor-love for Mr. Obama.

We will also pray for our new President because he (and we) face challenges that are not only daunting but potentially disastrous. We will pray that God will grant him wisdom. He and his family will face new challenges and the pressures of this office. May God protect them, give them joy in their family life, and hold them close together.

We will pray that God will protect this nation even as our new President settles into his role as Commander in Chief, and that God will grant peace as he leads the nation through times of trial and international conflict and tension.

We will pray that God would change President Obama's mind and heart on issues of crucial moral concern. May God change his heart and open his eyes to see abortion as the murder of the innocent unborn, to see marriage as an institution to be defended, and to see a host of issues in a new light. We must pray this from this day until the day he leaves office. God is sovereign, after all.

For those Christians who are more concerned than overjoyed about the prospects of an Obama presidency, there should be a remembrance that as our President, Barack Obama will have God-given authority to govern us, and that we should view him as a servant of God (Rom. 13:1, 4) to whom we should be subject (Rom. 13:1, 5; 1 Pet. 2:13-14). Thus, again, we are to pray for Barack Obama (1 Tim. 2:1-2). We are to thank God for Barack Obama (1 Tim. 2:1-2). We are to respect Barack Obama (Rom. 13:7). We are to honor Barack Obama (Rom. 13:7; 1 Pet. 2:17).

For those Christians who are more overjoyed than concerned about the prospects of an Obama presidency, there should be a remembrance of our ultimate allegiance: Jesus is Lord (and thus, He, not we, decides what is right and wrong), we serve God not man, and the Lord himself has promised to establish "the distinction between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves God and one who does not serve him" (Malachi 3:18). Thus, where our new president opposes or undermines biblical moral standards in our society, fails to uphold justice for the unborn, undermines religious liberties or condones an ethos that is hostile to the Gospel, we will pray for God's purposes to triumph over our President's plans and policies.

Without doubt and whatever our particular views may be, we face hard days ahead. Realistically, we must all expect to be frustrated and disappointed. Some now may feel defeated and discouraged. While others may all-too-soon find their audacious hopes unfounded and unrealized. We must all keep ever in mind that it is God who raises up leaders and nations, and it is God who pulls them down, and who judges both nations and rulers. We must not act or think like unbelievers, or as those who do not trust God.

So, now, Christian. Let’s get to work. And pray.

Lilian Calles Barger
SHELTERING THE BODY

Lilian Calles Barger

A couple of years ago I was invited to participate as a speaker at a Christian college’s body-awareness week. The weeklong program had been designed to address the rampant eating disorders and entrenched negative views of the body found particularly among the female students. The counseling office was overwhelmed by the need for a healthy and redeeming view of the body it saw desperately lacking among its students. Women, in unprecedented numbers, were starving themselves, engaging in bulimia, and confessing deep shame about their bodies. Some of the male students responded with the attitude that these women needed to get over their “personal sin” by repenting and straightening up. Other young men claimed that they also suffered from the “lookism” in our culture, which measures people’s worth by their appearance. How does this happen at a Christian college and among young people who have attended church all their lives? How does this happen at places that promote themselves as nurturing a Christian worldview and a certain degree of protection from the culture?

It doesn’t take much for us to see the distorted view of the body that our contemporary culture promotes. Christians are not immune. Daily we are surrounded by the message that to be a worthy human being (and an acceptable woman) we must be young, thin, flawless, and project White affluence: a message that is now globalized by mass media. Advertising is rampant with the message that to be a woman is to be a consumable object: always available “eye candy.” A look at a Victoria’s Secret window display or a Calvin Klein ad quickly proves this point.

The current obsession with the body can lead us to believe that American culture values the body above all else when, in actuality, it’s the historically low view of the body that is still prevalent today. As I explored in my book Eve’s Revenge: Women and a Spirituality of the Body (Brazos, 2003), today the body is seen as a pliable carrying case for the true self—the inner self. This inner self is frustrated by the limitations of the body, and these limitations quickly become impediments to self-actualization. Only by molding the body through a variety of means including extreme dieting, exercise, and surgical intervention can we be free to become who we wish to be. For women, this includes striving for an unattainable and narrow definition of beauty—a beauty standard that can only be reached by fashion models through vigilant control and computer enhancement. With the popularity of shows like The Swan and Extreme Makeover, we are led to believe that with enough money and determination we too can join the ranks of the young and beautiful. Young people grow up surrounded by these messages.

Within the Church and throughout much of its history, the body, particularly a woman’s body and its spiritual meaning, has been a source of tension. Are women’s bodies “the devil’s gateway,” as early Church father Tertullian claimed, or does the incarnation through Mary’s womb affirm woman’s participation in the redemptive plan? As God-bearer, Mary refutes the assumed “curse” on women and instead takes on a prophetic role (Luke 1:47-49).

Historically, the body, beauty, and virtue were tied up in a gnarly knot, which is still evident today. Even as we insist that inner beauty is what matters, a woman’s virtue is often judged by her physical beauty. It’s an idea immortalized in cultural stories; the fairy tale of the beautiful Cinderella and her wicked and ugly stepsisters, as an example, is still a powerful cultural image. Like Cinderella, women who are thin, pretty, and pulled together are judged to display more virtue. Faith-based diet books such as Help Lord, The Devil Wants Me Fat and the popular Weigh Down diet connect “overweight” too closely with “ugly sloth.” In these programs, dieting is no longer merely a health endeavor but a display of spiritual discipline and a way to control unruly flesh.

In the Christian marriage market, culturally-defined beauty can quickly come to equal purity of character and a submissive disposition. As a young teen I heard the book of Esther interpreted this way. Esther, who is biblically described as beautiful and yielded to God, replaces the insubordinate Queen Vashti. In the instruction I received, Esther’s beauty and obedience overshadowed her courage and prophetic work. More recently, in the best-selling book Captivating, John and Stasi Eldredge provide a standard for Christian womanhood. Wrapped in superficial beauty, women are encouraged to meet the essential desire of a man to rescue a beautiful woman. For many women, being loved and a narrow definition of beauty become too closely linked.

At the same time, however, young Christian women are taught that too much physical charm makes a woman dangerous and a prey for male lust. The instruction to be pretty but not too sexy can be difficult for young women, whose bodies are blooming, to navigate. When does pretty become sexy? They find it difficult to fit the mold of the “perfect Christian woman” who is both beautiful and virtuous. They may be further perplexed by sexual harassment and abuse from men in positions of authority. Growing up in the Church and in culture, it’s easy for young women to see their bodies as shameful and in need of being brought under control.

Several years ago I attended a large cosmopolitan church, which had a program for its eighth grade boys and girls designed to help them deal with their emerging sexuality. Before I was going to allow my children to participate in this program I wanted to know what would be taught, so I attended the girls’ session. I was appalled to hear the pastor’s wife tell the girls that it was their responsibility to avert male lust by instituting a narrow dress code, which included no sleeveless tops. The general tone of the instruction on sexuality was that the young women had the responsibility to set the sexual tone of romantic relationships. Young men were viewed as unable to control themselves sexually. In noting this, I am not suggesting that modesty is not valuable as a Christian discipline. When modesty is presented with the view that the female body is inherently seductive, however, it can only cause harm. Is it any wonder that young women show up on Christian college campuses with an ambivalent attitude towards their bodies?

Eating disorders, a negative body image, and a general disdain for the body are complex issues resulting from social, psychological, and spiritual factors that are too great to explore here. They touch on issues of power, the meaning of food, beauty, and one’s relationship to the community. Above all, I believe that for those who struggle with these issues it’s never purely a “personal” problem. Rather the culture’s and the Christian community’s dysfunctional attitudes regarding embodiment readily show up on the bodies of those with the least power. The college campus which I visited didn’t merely have a problem of a few women with poor body image. There was a deep-seated community-wide theological problem that caused people who have been called to freedom in Christ to succumb to the body-hating attitude of the culture at large. Because women have less social power and their bodies are viewed with suspicion, they become the ones who more often live out the lie—a lie that renders their bodies unsuitable vessels for God to use.

If we are to stand as a distinctive community, Christians must regain a full-orbed biblical understanding of embodiment and vehemently reject the objectification of the body and the devaluing of its meaning. The biblical worldview challenges the utilitarian view in which the body is at our disposal to do what we will. Our biblical basis is rooted in creation, the incarnation of God in Jesus, and the promise of the resurrection. Creation teaches that we are an intimate unity of body and soul and that our bodies are good (Genesis 2:7). Created by God, we use our bodies to work the earth, build relationships, and multiply (Genesis 1:28). In this task, the man’s and woman’s bodies are seen as “one flesh” (Genesis 2:23). Therefore, what is done to women’s bodies, and how they are viewed, affects the whole community. The incarnation further affirms the goodness of the body, and that woman is also a means by which God brings redemption into the world. The resurrection teaches us that God’s plan includes the redemption of our bodies from decay and death (Romans 8:23). These spiritual and historic truths provide a paradigm by which we can build body-affirming churches that serve as a refuge from cultural assault.

In The Rise of Christianity, religion scholar Rodney Stark notes the key body-affirming teachings that made the early Church a shelter for women who were escaping the pagan practices of female infanticide, coerced abortions, and obligatory marriages. The Christian faith freed their bodies from the enslavement of pagan culture and religion. The early Church was known for its care of the sick, rescue of babies left to die of exposure, and the burial of the dead. These practices made the Christian faith distinctive and powerful in a pagan culture. Once again, as today’s Church, we have the opportunity to reclaim our distinctiveness and challenge the body-hating practices of our day.

What’s important is not only what we claim to believe, but also the body-affirming practices that are inherent to Christianity. In Scripture we have been given baptism, the laying on of hands, and the holy meal as a way to bring our bodies into God’s redemptive plan. We can build on these foundational practices by seeking ways to share meals, tend to the physical needs of our community, and embrace people who are desperate for community. As noted by a therapist that I interviewed, people who habitually eat alone in front of the television or out of a box are more likely to have disordered eating, whether it’s eating too much or too little. People who are seldom touched have greater difficulty believing that their bodies matter. Christian practices that affirm the body serve as antidotes for a body-assaulting culture.

It is through the faith community’s transformation that our individual dysfunctional relationship to our bodies will be healed. This is a communal work of rediscovering a fresh understanding of the body’s meaning in the Christian faith and the practices that secure that meaning. This cannot be done if women’s bodies are still seen as a source of sin. It cannot be done until men and women work together as true partners in displaying God’s salvation to the world. We bear witness to God’s salvation by providing shelter from the assault on the body, and by living as those who wait eagerly, not reluctantly, for the redemption of the whole person.

Notes:
For further reading, please see my book Eve’s Revenge: Women and a Spirituality of the Body.

Lilian Calles Barger is a writer, speaker, and founder of the The Damaris Project, a program to assist women in starting spiritual conversations within their circle of friends. She is the author of Eve’s Revenge: Women and a Spirituality of the Body (Brazos, 2003) and the forthcoming Chasing Sophia: Reclaiming the Lost Wisdom of Jesus (Jossey-Bass, 2007). She lives in Dallas with her husband David and two teenage sons.

SHELTERING THE BODY Lilian Calles Barger A couple of years ago I was invited to participate as a speaker at a Christian college’s body-awareness week. The weeklong program had been designed to address the rampant eating disorders and entrenched negative views of the body found particularly among the female students. The counseling office was overwhelmed by the need for a healthy and redeeming view of the body it saw desperately lacking among its students. Women, in unprecedented numbers, were starving themselves, engaging in bulimia, and confessing deep shame about their bodies. Some of the male students responded with the attitude that these women needed to get over their “personal sin” by repenting and straightening up. Other young men claimed that they also suffered from the “lookism” in our culture, which measures people’s worth by their appearance. How does this happen at a Christian college and among young people who have attended church all their lives? How does this happen at places that promote themselves as nurturing a Christian worldview and a certain degree of protection from the culture? It doesn’t take much for us to see the distorted view of the body that our contemporary culture promotes. Christians are not immune. Daily we are surrounded by the message that to be a worthy human being (and an acceptable woman) we must be young, thin, flawless, and project White affluence: a message that is now globalized by mass media. Advertising is rampant with the message that to be a woman is to be a consumable object: always available “eye candy.” A look at a Victoria’s Secret window display or a Calvin Klein ad quickly proves this point. The current obsession with the body can lead us to believe that American culture values the body above all else when, in actuality, it’s the historically low view of the body that is still prevalent today. As I explored in my book Eve’s Revenge: Women and a Spirituality of the Body (Brazos, 2003), today the body is seen as a pliable carrying case for the true self—the inner self. This inner self is frustrated by the limitations of the body, and these limitations quickly become impediments to self-actualization. Only by molding the body through a variety of means including extreme dieting, exercise, and surgical intervention can we be free to become who we wish to be. For women, this includes striving for an unattainable and narrow definition of beauty—a beauty standard that can only be reached by fashion models through vigilant control and computer enhancement. With the popularity of shows like The Swan and Extreme Makeover, we are led to believe that with enough money and determination we too can join the ranks of the young and beautiful. Young people grow up surrounded by these messages. Within the Church and throughout much of its history, the body, particularly a woman’s body and its spiritual meaning, has been a source of tension. Are women’s bodies “the devil’s gateway,” as early Church father Tertullian claimed, or does the incarnation through Mary’s womb affirm woman’s participation in the redemptive plan? As God-bearer, Mary refutes the assumed “curse” on women and instead takes on a prophetic role (Luke 1:47-49). Historically, the body, beauty, and virtue were tied up in a gnarly knot, which is still evident today. Even as we insist that inner beauty is what matters, a woman’s virtue is often judged by her physical beauty. It’s an idea immortalized in cultural stories; the fairy tale of the beautiful Cinderella and her wicked and ugly stepsisters, as an example, is still a powerful cultural image. Like Cinderella, women who are thin, pretty, and pulled together are judged to display more virtue. Faith-based diet books such as Help Lord, The Devil Wants Me Fat and the popular Weigh Down diet connect “overweight” too closely with “ugly sloth.” In these programs, dieting is no longer merely a health endeavor but a display of spiritual discipline and a way to control unruly flesh. In the Christian marriage market, culturally-defined beauty can quickly come to equal purity of character and a submissive disposition. As a young teen I heard the book of Esther interpreted this way. Esther, who is biblically described as beautiful and yielded to God, replaces the insubordinate Queen Vashti. In the instruction I received, Esther’s beauty and obedience overshadowed her courage and prophetic work. More recently, in the best-selling book Captivating, John and Stasi Eldredge provide a standard for Christian womanhood. Wrapped in superficial beauty, women are encouraged to meet the essential desire of a man to rescue a beautiful woman. For many women, being loved and a narrow definition of beauty become too closely linked. At the same time, however, young Christian women are taught that too much physical charm makes a woman dangerous and a prey for male lust. The instruction to be pretty but not too sexy can be difficult for young women, whose bodies are blooming, to navigate. When does pretty become sexy? They find it difficult to fit the mold of the “perfect Christian woman” who is both beautiful and virtuous. They may be further perplexed by sexual harassment and abuse from men in positions of authority. Growing up in the Church and in culture, it’s easy for young women to see their bodies as shameful and in need of being brought under control. Several years ago I attended a large cosmopolitan church, which had a program for its eighth grade boys and girls designed to help them deal with their emerging sexuality. Before I was going to allow my children to participate in this program I wanted to know what would be taught, so I attended the girls’ session. I was appalled to hear the pastor’s wife tell the girls that it was their responsibility to avert male lust by instituting a narrow dress code, which included no sleeveless tops. The general tone of the instruction on sexuality was that the young women had the responsibility to set the sexual tone of romantic relationships. Young men were viewed as unable to control themselves sexually. In noting this, I am not suggesting that modesty is not valuable as a Christian discipline. When modesty is presented with the view that the female body is inherently seductive, however, it can only cause harm. Is it any wonder that young women show up on Christian college campuses with an ambivalent attitude towards their bodies? Eating disorders, a negative body image, and a general disdain for the body are complex issues resulting from social, psychological, and spiritual factors that are too great to explore here. They touch on issues of power, the meaning of food, beauty, and one’s relationship to the community. Above all, I believe that for those who struggle with these issues it’s never purely a “personal” problem. Rather the culture’s and the Christian community’s dysfunctional attitudes regarding embodiment readily show up on the bodies of those with the least power. The college campus which I visited didn’t merely have a problem of a few women with poor body image. There was a deep-seated community-wide theological problem that caused people who have been called to freedom in Christ to succumb to the body-hating attitude of the culture at large. Because women have less social power and their bodies are viewed with suspicion, they become the ones who more often live out the lie—a lie that renders their bodies unsuitable vessels for God to use. If we are to stand as a distinctive community, Christians must regain a full-orbed biblical understanding of embodiment and vehemently reject the objectification of the body and the devaluing of its meaning. The biblical worldview challenges the utilitarian view in which the body is at our disposal to do what we will. Our biblical basis is rooted in creation, the incarnation of God in Jesus, and the promise of the resurrection. Creation teaches that we are an intimate unity of body and soul and that our bodies are good (Genesis 2:7). Created by God, we use our bodies to work the earth, build relationships, and multiply (Genesis 1:28). In this task, the man’s and woman’s bodies are seen as “one flesh” (Genesis 2:23). Therefore, what is done to women’s bodies, and how they are viewed, affects the whole community. The incarnation further affirms the goodness of the body, and that woman is also a means by which God brings redemption into the world. The resurrection teaches us that God’s plan includes the redemption of our bodies from decay and death (Romans 8:23). These spiritual and historic truths provide a paradigm by which we can build body-affirming churches that serve as a refuge from cultural assault. In The Rise of Christianity, religion scholar Rodney Stark notes the key body-affirming teachings that made the early Church a shelter for women who were escaping the pagan practices of female infanticide, coerced abortions, and obligatory marriages. The Christian faith freed their bodies from the enslavement of pagan culture and religion. The early Church was known for its care of the sick, rescue of babies left to die of exposure, and the burial of the dead. These practices made the Christian faith distinctive and powerful in a pagan culture. Once again, as today’s Church, we have the opportunity to reclaim our distinctiveness and challenge the body-hating practices of our day. What’s important is not only what we claim to believe, but also the body-affirming practices that are inherent to Christianity. In Scripture we have been given baptism, the laying on of hands, and the holy meal as a way to bring our bodies into God’s redemptive plan. We can build on these foundational practices by seeking ways to share meals, tend to the physical needs of our community, and embrace people who are desperate for community. As noted by a therapist that I interviewed, people who habitually eat alone in front of the television or out of a box are more likely to have disordered eating, whether it’s eating too much or too little. People who are seldom touched have greater difficulty believing that their bodies matter. Christian practices that affirm the body serve as antidotes for a body-assaulting culture. It is through the faith community’s transformation that our individual dysfunctional relationship to our bodies will be healed. This is a communal work of rediscovering a fresh understanding of the body’s meaning in the Christian faith and the practices that secure that meaning. This cannot be done if women’s bodies are still seen as a source of sin. It cannot be done until men and women work together as true partners in displaying God’s salvation to the world. We bear witness to God’s salvation by providing shelter from the assault on the body, and by living as those who wait eagerly, not reluctantly, for the redemption of the whole person. Notes: For further reading, please see my book Eve’s Revenge: Women and a Spirituality of the Body.

Lilian Calles Barger is a writer, speaker, and founder of the The Damaris Project, a program to assist women in starting spiritual conversations within their circle of friends. She is the author of Eve’s Revenge: Women and a Spirituality of the Body (Brazos, 2003) and the forthcoming Chasing Sophia: Reclaiming the Lost Wisdom of Jesus (Jossey-Bass, 2007). She lives in Dallas with her husband David and two teenage sons.

Henri Nouwen "Holy Inefficiency" article by Yancey

A better symbol of the Incarnation, I can hardly imagine.

-by PHILIP YANCEY

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Once when I was dining with a group of writers, the conversation turned to letters we get from readers. Richard Foster and Eugene Peterson mentioned an intense young man who had been seeking spiritual direction from both of them. They responded as best they could, answering questions by mail and recommending books on spirituality. Foster had just learned that the same inquirer had also contacted Henri Nouwen. "You won't believe what Nouwen did," he said. "He invited this stranger to live with him for a month so he could mentor him in person."

Most writers jealously protect their schedules and privacy. Nouwen, who died of a heart attack this past September, broke down such barriers of professionalism. His entire life, in fact, displayed a "holy inefficiency."

Trained in Holland as a psychologist and a theologian, Nouwen spent his early years achieving. He taught at Notre Dame, Yale, and Harvard, averaged more than a book a year, and traveled widely as a conference speaker. He had a résumé to die for-which was the problem, exactly. The pressing schedule and relentless competition were suffocating his own spiritual life.

Nouwen went to South America for six months, scouting a new role for himself as a missionary in the Third World. A hectic speaking schedule on his return to the United States only made things worse. Finally, Nouwen fell into the arms of the L'Arche community in France, a home for the seriously disabled. He felt so nourished by them that he agreed to become priest in residence at a similar home in Toronto called Daybreak. There, Nouwen spent his last ten years, still writing and traveling to speak here and there, but always returning to the haven of Daybreak.

I once visited Nouwen, sharing lunch with him in his small room. It had a single bed, one bookshelf, and a few pieces of Shaker-style furniture. The walls were unadorned except for a print of a Van Gogh painting and a few religious symbols. A Daybreak staff person served us a bowl of Caesar salad and a loaf of bread. No fax machine, no computer, no Daytimer calendar posted on the wall-in this room, at least, Nouwen had found serenity. The church "industry" seemed very far away.

After lunch we celebrated a special Eucharist for Adam, the young man Nouwen looked after. With solemnity, but also a twinkle in his eye, Nouwen led the liturgy in honor of Adam's twenty-sixth birthday. Unable to talk, walk, or dress himself, profoundly retarded, Adam gave no sign of comprehension. He seemed to recognize, at least, that his family had come. He drooled throughout the ceremony and grunted loudly a few times.

Later Nouwen told me it took him nearly two hours to prepare Adam each day. Bathing and shaving him, brushing his teeth, combing his hair, guiding his hand as he tried to eat breakfast-these simple, repetitive acts had become for him almost like an hour of meditation.

I must admit I had a fleeting doubt as to whether this was the best use of the busy priest's time. Could not someone else take over the manual chores? When I cautiously broached the subject with Nouwen himself, he informed me that I had completely misinterpreted him. "I am not giving up anything," he insisted. "It is I, not Adam, who gets the main benefit from our friendship."

All day Nouwen kept circling back to my question, bringing up various ways he had benefitted from his relationship with Adam. It had been difficult for him at first, he said. Physical touch, affection, and the messiness of caring for an uncoordinated person did not come easily. But he had learned to love Adam, truly to love him. In the process he had learned what it must be like for God to love us--spiritually uncoordinated, retarded, able to respond with what must seem to God like inarticulate grunts and groans. Indeed, working with Adam had taught him the humility and "emptiness" achieved by desert monks only after much discipline.

Nouwen has said that all his life two voices competed inside him. One encouraged him to succeed and achieve, while the other called him simply to rest in the comfort that he was "the beloved" of God. Only in the last decade of his life did he truly listen to that second voice.

Ultimately Nouwen concluded that "the goal of education and formation for the ministry is continually to recognize the Lord's voice, his face, and his touch in every person we meet." Reading that description in his book ¡Gracias!, I understand why he did not think it a waste of time to invite a seeking stranger to live with him for a month, or to devote two hours a day to the menial care of Adam.

I will miss Henri Nouwen. For some, his legacy consists of his many books, for others his role as a bridge between Catholics and Protestants, for others his distinguished career at Ivy League universities. For me, though, a single image captures him best: the energetic priest, hair in disarray, using his restless hands as if to fashion a homily out of thin air, celebrating an eloquent birthday Eucharist for an unresponsive child-man so damaged that many parents would have had him aborted. A better symbol of the Incarnation, I can hardly imagine.

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Copyright © 1996 by Christianity Today International/Christianity Today Magazine. December 9, 1996 Vol. 40, No. 14, Page 80

Messiah Handel Yancey article

Hallelujah!

On a memorable London night, the bright and glistening theology of Messiah broke through my jet-lagged consciousness.

By Philip Yancey

Just before Christmas of 1988 my wife, and I visited London. As the plane banked sharply over the city's center, we saw rowing crews on the Thames, and also Parliament, Whitehall Palace, and other landmark buildings lit in sepia by the slanting rays of morning sun. A fingernail moon hung low in the sky, and the morning star still shone. This was one of London's rare, perfect winter days.

Later that day, half-drunk on coffee, we were dragging along city streets, trying to wrench our biological clocks forward seven time zones by staying awake until dusk. Just before turning in, we lined up in a queue to order some theater tickets. That's when I saw the poster: "One Night Only. Handel's Messiah performed by the National Westminster Choir and National Chamber Orchestra at the Barbican Centre." The ticket seller assured me that of all Messiah performances in London, this was clearly the best. There were only two problems: the concert would begin in one hour, and it was sold out.

Twenty minutes later, following some spirited intramarital negotiations, we were in our hotel room squeezing out yet another round of Visine and dressing for a sold-out concert. This moment of serendipity we could not let pass. "Our presence is divinely ordained," I assured my wife. "We are in Handel's home town, where he wrote the piece." Surely a trifling matter like a sellout would not deter us from finding a way inside where we would enjoy an unsurpassed musical experience. Janet's arched eyebrow conveyed unmistakably what she thought of my circumstantial theology, but she indulged me.

After a pell-mell taxi ride to the concert hall, we stumbled across a civic-minded English chap who offered us his extra tickets at half price. My theology was looking better all the time. I started to relax, anticipating a soothing evening of baroque music. Seated on the back row of the main floor, we were ideally positioned for a catnap should the need arise.

I hardly anticipated what I got that evening. I had, of course, heard Handel's Messiah often. But something about this time—my sleep-starved, caffeine-buzzed state, the London setting, the performance itself—transported me back closer, much closer, to Handel's day. The event became not just a performance but a kind of epiphany, a striking revelation of Christian theology. I felt able to see beyond the music to the soul of the piece.

London, 1741
When George Frideric Handel composed Messiah, he was already the most famous musician of his time, enjoying an international reputation. In Italy he wowed audiences by dueling Domenico Scarlatti on the organ and harpsichord; while there, he also absorbed the romantic spirit and mastered the techniques of Italian composition. A subsequent trip to England earned this German-born composer such acclaim that, two years later, he returned to stay, becoming a naturalized citizen.

In the early eighteenth century, London was arguably the most vibrant city in the world. Alexander Pope and Jonathan Swift led a band of iconoclastic wits and essayists. Sir Isaac Newton was spearheading what was to become a scientific revolution. In such a setting Handel had to run a gauntlet of sophisticated and snobbish music critics.

Yet composers also had to please live audiences. Spectators would play cards, wander around, crack nuts, spit freely, and loudly hiss or boo a singer they disliked. Handel thrived in this hurly-burly environment. A huge man, with an explosive temperament and expansive ego, he met the challenge by churning out a series of lively Italian operas—over 40 in all—that kept audiences enthralled for 25 years.

Eventually London's appetite for Italian opera was satiated. Soon after, Handel's company went bankrupt and he had to seek a new genre of composition. Around the same time (1737), Handel suffered a stroke, an affliction that, some biographers suggest, helped nudge him toward religious themes. He made the acquaintance of Charles Jennens, a wealthy eccentric who wrote librettos based on passages from Shakespeare, the Bible, and the Book of Common Prayer. The two began collaborating on a new art form, the biblical oratorio, an English-language religious opera.

The bishop of London scowled at the notion of presenting sacred Scripture theatrically and withheld his sanction. But Londoners flocked to Handel's presentations of Saul, Belshazzar, Esther, Deborah, Solomon, Israel in Egypt, Jephtha, and Samson—nearly 20 oratorios in all. Ever the showman, Handel scheduled himself as organ soloist at every premiere.

In the midst of this fertile period, Jennens brought Handel a script based on the life of Jesus. It was far more "conceptual" than Handel's other oratorios, and featured little stage action. Unlike the great German choral works, this one told Jesus' story indirectly, relying mostly on quotations from the Prophets and Psalms with only a sprinkling of Gospel passages. The libretto moved Handel deeply, and he set to work right away. His working speed was legendary, but this time he surpassed himself: in just 24 days, drawing on inspiration and some old material, he put together his great Messiah. The original manuscript still survives, its smudges, ink spots, and hasty corrections betraying the headlong pace of composition.

Alone of Handel's oratorios, Messiah did not debut in London. Twenty-six vocalists and a few instrumentalists, conducted by the composer himself, gave the first performance as a charity benefit in Dublin, Ireland, in April of 1742. The Passion season fit Messiah's themes perfectly (although it has since become almost exclusively a Christmas piece), and the charitable cause helped lessen the shock for an audience still nervous about hearing sacred text sung by worldly stage personalities.

In contrast to the stunning success in Dublin, London gave Messiah a cool reception the following year. Handel presented a slightly altered version in 1745, but that too met with little enthusiasm. Four years later another performance in Covent Garden went over well enough to encourage annual revivals. In Handel's last public appearance, he, then 74 and totally blind, took the baton to lead one more performance of Messiah as a benefit for his favorite charity, the Foundling Hospital.

In the last two-and-a-half centuries, not a single year has passed without a performance of Handel's Messiah.

Part 1: Bethlehem
As I leaned back in the Barbican Centre's padded seat and listened to the familiar beginning of Messiah, it was easy to understand how the oratorio came to be associated with the Advent season. Handel begins with a collection of lilting prophecies from Isaiah about a coming king who will bring peace and comfort to a disturbed and violent world. The music builds, swelling from a solo tenor ("Comfort ye my people ... ") to a full chorus joyously celebrating the day when "the glory of the Lord shall be revealed."

I had spent the morning viewing England's remnants of glory, and it occurred to me that just such images of wealth and power must have filled the minds of Isaiah's contemporaries who first heard that promise. I had seen the crown jewels, a solid-gold ruler's mace, and the gilded carriage of the Lord Mayor of London. When the Hebrews heard Isaiah's words, undoubtedly those dispossessed and landless refugees thought back with sharp nostalgia to the glory days of Solomon, when the palace and temple gleamed bright.

Yet rulers who bring a nation glory and prestige often do so by oppressing their subjects and leaching away their wealth. How many poor laborers paid taxes to gild the Lord Mayor's carriage, or King Solomon's residence? Because strong rulers thrive in a climate of fear, even the long-awaited Messiah inspired fear in the prophets. After its boisterous opening, I was surprised to hear Handel's Messiah shift so quickly to a somber, even foreboding tone, as if in recognition of this darker side of rulership. The bass warns of a Lord of Hosts who will shake the heavens and the earth, the sea and the dry land.

Israelites were raised with a fear of God so profound that they would not speak or write his name, and from the Messiah they feared not the tyranny of injustice, but rather the prospect of holy justice. "But who may abide the day of his coming?" the contralto cries out in alarm, "For he is like a refiner's fire." If the Lord of Hosts paid a personal visit to corrupted Earth, would any of its inhabitants survive? Would Earth itself survive? The good news of hope hangs in limbo for a moment.

Then out of the tension in Handel's music there soon emerge gentle, familiar words that strikingly resolve the contradiction of a powerful, but comforting ruler: "Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Emmanuel, 'God with us.'" The God who comes to Earth comes not in a raging whirlwind, nor in a devouring fire. He comes instead in the tiniest form imaginable: as an ovum, and then fetus, growing cell by cell inside a humble teenage virgin. In Jesus, God found at last a mode of approach that human beings need not fear: a helpless baby suckling at his mother's breast.

"Behold your God!" the chorus joins in, as if astonished. I wondered how many of the Londoners celebrating Christmas caught the sense of scandal. Stores outside displayed Dickensian scenes of Christmas mirth, and mangers dotted the town squares. But how many grasped the awesome implications of "Immensity cloistered in thy dear womb"? As G. K. Chesterton once marveled, "The hands that had made the sun and stars were too small to reach the huge heads of the cattle."

Messiah lapses into an orchestral interlude, as if to let listeners ponder the two-pronged mission of a Messiah sent from Almighty God. And then it leaps ahead in time, from the prophets' promises to the stirring birth announcement in a pasture bordering Bethlehem. There, angels proclaimed to quaking shepherds that the reign of fear had ended. Fear not! That very night, God was doing an entirely new thing on Earth: he was becoming one of us. "Glory to God in the highest!" Handel's chorus sings.

Thus Part I of Messiah circles back to an old word, glory, but in the process bestows on it a new meaning. The Messiah is a king, but not one who relishes gold chariots and crown jewels. Soloists describe instead a king who opens the eyes of the blind and loosens the tongues of the mute, of a king who "shall feed his flock like a shepherd" and "shall gather the lambs with his arm."

For this reason Part 1 can end with a tender, almost paradoxical invitation: "Come unto him, all ye ... that are heavy laden, and he will give you rest. ... His yoke is easy, and his burden is light." The Messiah rules, surely, but he rules with a rod of love. Who may abide the day of his coming? Anyone may abide it; all who come unto him will be welcomed.

Part 2: Calvary
During intermission we mingled with other concert goers, and downed yet another cup of coffee. The drama of Part 1 was working its effect on me, however, even as I traded pleasantries in the lobby. Suddenly it seemed very odd to be sitting so politely as we listened to this earth-shattering story. We should be jumping or clapping hands, like charismatics.

Everyone else seemed quite calm and unperturbed, though, and we found our seats again and prepared for Messiah, Part 2. Any listener, no matter how musically naive, can sense an ominous change in the opening sounds. Handel telegraphs the darkening mood with dense orchestral chords in a minor key, then has the chorus announce it with his ever-significant introductory word, "Behold the Lamb of God!" Part 2 describes the world's response to that Messiah born of a virgin, and the story is tragic beyond all telling.

Handel relies mostly on the words of Isaiah 52-53, that remarkably vivid account written centuries before Jesus' birth. All sound ceases for a moment, and after this dramatic pause the contralto, with no accompaniment, gives the disturbing news: "He was de-spis-ed ... re-ject-ed." She pronounces each syllable with great effort, as if the facts of history are too painful to recite. Violins hauntingly reiterate each phrase.

At Calvary, history hung suspended. The bright hopes that had swirled around the long-awaited deliverer of Israel collapsed in darkness that fateful night. Dangling like a scarecrow between two thieves, the Messiah provoked at worst derision, at best pity. "All they that see him laugh him to scorn," says the tenor, who then adds, in the most poignant moment of Handel's oratorio, "Behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto his sorrow."

Yet all is not lost! A few measures later the same tenor introduces the first glimmer of hope: "But thou didst not leave his soul in hell." Almost immediately the whole chorus takes up the shout of joy: "Lift up your heads, O ye gates." For the defeat at Calvary was only an apparent defeat. The scarecrow corpse did not remain a corpse. He was the King of Glory after all!

Handel uses the rest of Part 2 to celebrate the triumph wrested from seeming defeat. Nations may rage together, conspiring against peace and justice, but "He that dwelleth in heaven shall laugh them to scorn." The word-play is intentional: he that was laughed to scorn will have the last laugh.

"Hallelujah!" the chorus cries out at last, and from there the music soars into what is unarguably the most famous portion of Handel's Messiah, and one of the most jubilant passages of music ever composed. Handel himself said that when he wrote the "Hallelujah!" chorus, "I did think I did see all Heaven before me, and the Great God himself."

Part 1 ends with a scriptural invitation ("Come unto him") based on a paradox; Part 2 explains the paradox of how his yoke can indeed be easy, and his burden light. It is because of a transfer of suffering. At the cross, the pain and sorrow of humanity became the pain and sorrow of God. The chorus early on states it well: "Surely, he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows ... and with his stripes we are healed."

Furthermore, in that act death itself died. What happened next, on the day of resurrection, was a miracle deserving of all praise, deserving of the "Hallelujah!" chorus.

Part 3: Eternity
At the London premiere of Messiah, King George I stood for the singing of the "Hallelujah!" chorus. Some skeptics suggest that the king stood to his feet less out of respect for "Hallelujah!" than out of the mistaken assumption that Messiah had reached its conclusion. Even today novices in the audience make the same mistake. Who can blame them? After two hours of performance, the music seems to culminate in the rousing chorus. What more is needed?

I had never really considered the question until that night at the Barbican Centre. But as I glanced at the few paragraphs of libretto remaining, I realized what was missing from Parts 1 and 2. They supply the narrative of Jesus' life, but not the underlying meaning. Part 3 steps out from the story and, gathering quotations from Romans, 1 Corinthians, and Revelation, provides that essential layer of interpretation.

When we flew to England earlier that day, the route took us over the polar ice cap. I knew that beneath the ice cap, nuclear attack submarines prowled, each one capable of killing a hundred million human beings. We landed in London to the news that a train had crashed, killing 51 commuters. Within the week, a terrorist bombed Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing 270. Is this the world God had in mind at Creation? The world Jesus had in mind at Incarnation?

For reasons such as these, Handel's Messiah could not rightly end with the "Hallelujah!" chorus. The Messiah has come in "glory" (Part 1); the Messiah has died and been resurrected (Part 2). Why, then, does the world remain in such a sorry state? Part 3 attempts an answer. Beyond the images from Bethlehem and Calvary, one more messianic image is needed: the Messiah as Sovereign Lord. The Incarnation did not usher in the end of history—only the beginning of the end. Much work remains before creation is restored to God's original intent.

In a brilliant stroke, Part 3 of Messiah opens with a quotation from Job, that tragic figure who clung stubbornly to faith amid circumstances that called for bleak despair. "I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth," the soprano sings out. Overwhelmed by tragedy, with scant evidence of a sovereign God, Job still managed to believe; and, Handel implies, so should we.

From that defiant opening, Part 3 shifts to the apostle Paul's theological explanation of Christ's death ("Since by man came death ... ") and then moves quickly to his lofty words about a final resurrection ("The trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised").

Just as the tragedy of Good Friday was transformed into the triumph of Easter Sunday, one day all war, all violence, all injustice, all sadness will likewise be transformed. Then and only then we will be able to say, "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" The soprano carries that thought forward to its logical conclusion, quoting from Romans 8: "If God be for us, who can be against us?" If we believe, truly believe, that the last enemy has been destroyed, then we indeed have nothing to fear. At long last, death is swallowed up in victory.

Handel's masterwork ends with a single scene frozen in time. To make his point about the Christ of eternity, librettist Jennens could have settled on the scene from Revelation 2, where Jesus appears with a face like the shining sun and eyes like blazing fire. Instead, his text concludes with the scene from Revelation 4-5, perhaps the most vivid image in a book of vivid imagery.

Twenty-four impressive rulers are gathered together, along with four living creatures who represent strength and wisdom and majesty—the best in all creation. These creatures and rulers kneel respectfully before a throne luminous with lightning and encircled by a rainbow. An angel asks who is worthy to break a seal that will open up the scroll of history. Neither the creatures nor the 24 rulers are worthy. The author realizes well the significance of that moment, "I wept and wept because no one was found who was worthy to open the scroll or look inside."

Besides these creatures, impotent for the grand task, one more creature stands before the throne. Though appearance offers little to recommend him, he is nevertheless history's sole remaining hope. "Then I saw a Lamb, looking as if it had been slain." A lamb! A helpless, baa-baa lamb, and a slaughtered one at that! Yet John in Revelation, and Handel in Messiah, sum up all history in this one mysterious image. The great God who became a baby, who became a lamb, who became a sacrifice—this God, who bore our stripes and died our death, this one alone is worthy. That is where Handel leaves us, with the chorus "Worthy Is the Lamb," followed by exultant amens.

We were sitting in a modern brick-and-oak auditorium in the late twentieth century in a materialistic culture light years removed from the imagery of slaughtered lambs. But Handel understood that history and civilization are not what they appear. Auditoriums, dynasties, civilizations-all rise and fall. History has proven beyond doubt that nothing fashioned by the hand of humanity will last. We need something greater than history, something outside history. We need a Lamb slain before the foundations of the world.

I confess that belief in an invisible world, a world beyond this one, does not come easily for me. Like many moderns, I sometimes wonder if reality ends with the material world around us, if life ends at death, if history ends with annihilation or solar exhaustion. But that evening I had no such doubts. Jet lag and fatigue had produced in me something akin to an out-of-body state, and for that moment the grand tapestry woven by Handel's music seemed more real by far than my everyday world. I felt I had a glimpse of the grand sweep of history. And all of it centered in the Messiah who came on a rescue mission, who died on that mission, and who wrought from that death the salvation of the world. I went away with renewed belief that he (and we) shall indeed reign forever and ever.

It was a good decision after all, attending this serendipitous concert.

Philip Yancey is a columnist and editor at large for Christianity Today. This article originally appeared on December 15, 1989.