As I mentioned last week, I’m am excited to be part of the blog tour for Daniel Kirk’s latest book Jesus Have I Loved, but Paul? Drop by the blog tour website to read others’ contributions to the tour as they interact with various chapters in the book (and don’t forget to enter the contest to win a free copy of the book!). As luck would have it (or perhaps because I’m the only woman participating in the tour), I was asked to engage with Chapter 6 “Women in the Story of God.”

In my experience, the number one reason people have issues with Paul is because of the passages regarding women's roles in his letters. A few select passages seemingly calling for women to submit to men and to be silent in church are enough for many to jettison Paul from the canon. As some read Paul (or at least have had Paul imposed upon them), he seems to be denying the very humanity and dignity of women – something that Jesus never did. With such an interpretation as a given, it’s difficult for many to figure out what to do with Paul. There are of course those that use such an interpretation of Paul to demean and oppress women. Some believing that they have no right to question that interpretation accept it and yet keep Paul at a distance, like a creepy relative that they would prefer not to show up at family gatherings. Others outright reject Paul, claiming that such a patriarchal attitude nullifies any right his words have to speak into our world today. Some accept Paul, but insist that his words restricting women must have been added by some later scribe. In light of all that, it's easy to see how it's hard to love Paul.

Yet I’ve generally found all those approaches to be lacking. Having to choose between rejecting the reality of the biblical context or rejecting the Bible because of the reality of the biblical context both seemed too limiting for me.

So I appreciate the approach Kirk offers in his book. In situating Paul within the context of the larger narrative of scripture, he begins by addressing how women are treated in the text beyond the traditional “clobber-women-into-submission” passages. What he reveals is a world where patriarchy is the norm and yet women are find opportunities to serve in all areas of the church. From the scriptural evidence of what women were in truth doing in the church, Kirk argues that the controversial passages have both at times been interpreted wrongly and yet give testimony to the ambiguity present in scripture. He states, “As for Scripture, it not only sows seeds of equality whose flowers never fully bloom on its pages; it also continues to reflect and, at times, affirm the inequalities endemic to its ancient cultural context.” (118). In short, the Bible contains both stories of women leading churches, preaching and prophesying, and embracing greater dignity in the church than their culture ever bestowed upon them as well as statements supporting the gender hierarchies of the time. Kirk concludes that to argue that the Bible is either fully egalitarian or fully patriarchal is to ignore its cultural situation.

But although that cultural context might be messy and not reflect fully what we might want to find in Scripture, Kirk argues that what is most important is to remember that we are part of the ongoing narrative of God’s story. He writes that this narrative “is as dramatic and sweeping a gospel narrative as one could hope for. … Paul’s narrative of salvation is nothing less than the proclamation and embodiment here and now of the coming dominion of God” (50). So therefore, “because it is a story of cosmic transformation, the story has to be embodied and lived” (51). To proclaim the dominion of God is to live in its ways here and now – to testify to its transforming power. The gospel gives “glimpses of a new creation that has no hierarchical distinction between male and female. It is not a vision that is worked out consistently in the first-century culture in which the New Testament writings grew-up, but it is one that fits within the plot of a story that turns all social hierarchies on their head as God comes to rule the world through a crucified Messiah” (137) Instead of giving sin power by letting the patriarchy of that time keep us from living out the redemptive nature of new creation now, Kirk calls us to instead embrace Christ’s redemptive work and turn upside-down the controlling hierarchies of this world.

I greatly appreciate this take on Paul that affirms both the reality of his context and the reality of what women were doing in the early church. Placing myself within a continuing narrative witnessing to new creation makes far more sense to me than just rejecting Paul because he isn’t who I would like for him to be. I do wish though that Kirk had explored whether he thought it would have been appropriate for women to live into that narrative of New Creation in periods in history where it might have caused the surrounded cultures to be offended. Should women’s dignity, worth, and equality be affirmed because such things are true or only when affirming them would not give offense within a particular culture? I get that Paul may have imposed restrictions on women so that they wouldn’t offend the culture, but I am left wondering in this interpretation at what point one should simply embrace New Creation in spite of the culture that does not understand the light shining in the darkness?

I found myself most troubled in this chapter when immediately after arguing that we should embrace Christ’s redemptive power by affirming an egalitarian position on gender, Kirk jumped straight to the most common argument used to temper the radical assertion of equality. He is quick to say that real Christ-like egalitarianism is not therefore a call for women to seek out positions of leadership in the church as to be called to Christ is to accept the hard life of submission and servant hood. While I wouldn’t argue that following Christ does involve a servant’s heart, this is an argument that has been used over and over as simply a backhanded way of asserting patriarchy in the name of equality. I honestly don’t think Kirk intended to do so here, but I do wonder if he was unaware of how this argument has been used to give lip-service to egalitarianism while ensuring nothing really changes in the male-dominated church.

As many feminist scholars have argued, to accuse women of the sin of self-seeking pride when they attempt to use their God-given gifts leads to many women burying those gifts lest they fall into sin. They are bullied into passivity under the guise of humility. That is not what it means though to follow Christ and live into the telos of who God created us to be. Centuries though of being told that unless we submit and let men dominate us we are sinning and not being sufficiently Christ-like are difficult to overcome. The last thing women need to hear more of is that we are sinning or living in the ways of the world when we choose to accept God’s call to use the gifts God has given us.

We still live in a world marred by the oppressive ways of patriarchy. The dominion of God where there is no male or female is not yet fully realized, although we are called to live as if it is. Perhaps we still need gender specific instructions for how to live in these ways. To men, yes, counter years of living in unChrist-like ways by telling them to be servants and to not pursue positions of power in the church. But, to women, don’t reinforce the idea that they are sining by living into their gifts. Encourage them instead to reject the ways of the world by accepting their gifts and having no fear in using them to serve Christ. I don’t believe that Daniel Kirk was trying to reinforce gender hierarchies by bringing up this standard caution regarding egalitarianism, but I would be remiss to not mention what the warning can imply for women. We are still living into this narrative that affirms the breaking in of the reign of God in the here and now, and so I do greatly appreciate this book’s helpful way of realistically dealing with often unsettling texts. Even as the New Creation is yet unfolding, so it seems is our ability to figure out how to best embrace Christ’s redemption in our lives.

Although I would have liked this chapter to offer more constructive suggestions for navigating gender in the New Creation, I appreciate the ways in which it reframes the conversation regarding Paul and women. For those of us who have never felt comfortable with the options given to us for how we should handle Paul, it proposes an affirming yet realistic engagement that allows both Scripture and the transformative redemptive power of Christ to co-exist as part of the narrative of God’s people.

Living into the expectation of the incarnation is not a passive endeavor. Anticipating Advent is not about quietistic waiting but living into promised hope and freedom. It is letting the breaking in of Christ into our world release us from systems of fear that entrap us and patterns of sin that deny the very hope of the incarnation. Traditionally in the Western church Advent was a time of prayer, fasting, and acts of service (it still is in the Eastern Church). One did not wait simply to wait; one prepared oneself to meet the coming Christ by disciplining oneself in the very liberating ways of Christ. The advent of Christ in the past and the promised reconciling advent of Christ in the future are remembered and anticipated by living into the advent of Christ in the present through these acts of discipleship. Christ suffered so that we could have this freedom and hope, so we therefore accept this freedom from fear and sin by disciplining ourselves into becoming ever more Christ-like. It is not a tedious waiting around, but an embodied anticipation that consumes every moment of our lives.

So it is curious that during this time of year that instead of anticipating Christ by accepting our freedom from fear and sin by imitating Christ and doing likewise for others, we instead use our freedom to create systems of fear for others. Advent is less about preparation and discipline these days as it is forcing others to live in fear of Christians. For some their freedom in Christ has become justification for insisting that all people orient their lives around catering to them. A culture of fear is created where their freedom is upheld at all costs, even at the expense of the freedom of others. Freedom becomes for some less about Christ’s redeeming and reconciling work and more about ensuring their freedom by insisting that everyone else become exactly like them. Christ’s offer is therefore repeatedly cheapened each time they insist that their freedom isn’t real unless, for instance, atheists, Jews, Muslims, and commercial centers fearfully sacrifice their freedoms and acknowledge a certain interpretation of Jesus as the reason for the season.

Instead of accepting the freedom Christ offered through his suffering by accepting a life that embraces even suffering (or simply the mild inconvenience of exposure to the other) in order to do the same for others, Christians are insisting that others suffer for them. But insisting that others proclaim what should be the liberating and reconciling name of Christ by threatening to boycott their businesses or bringing lawsuits against them isn’t to live into the expectation of the incarnation. Can one truly have witnessed to hope and embraced release from fear and sin if one’s visible response to such is to in turn force others into a place of fear devoid of hope? As in the parable Jesus tells of the unforgiving servant, it does not represent the kingdom of God to accept ones freedom and forgiveness by then turning around and oppressing others.

The breaking in of Christ into the world changed everything. We actively await the advent of Christ by accepting the gift of Christ’s first advent. But what Christ offered was the gift of a new identity, of new creation. Living into that identity takes work; it takes discipline. New creations do not repeat the fearful patterns of this world by pushing them off onto others while hoarding the supposed blessings of freedom for themselves. To anticipate the gift of advent requires radical change of those that wait. As Jürgen Moltmann wrote of this promise of advent past, present, and future,

Every gift involves change. When unjust men and women are justified, the consequence is that they are sent out to work for more social justice. When peaceless men and women are reconciled, the consequence is that they are sent out to make peace in the conflicts of this society. There can be no other response for Christians to their experience of God.

If we expect God we have to respond to God as God calls us to respond. Releasing us from our fears and sins is never a call for us to bind others with the same. Waiting for the breaking in of Christ in this world is not a sanctioning of actions that oppose the very way of Christ. Maybe it would therefore be helpful to return to Advent as a disciplined period of prayer, fasting, and good works. Perhaps then we could anticipate the incarnation by actually incarnating Christ in the world.

His story intrigued me. I’m all for forgiveness and rehabilitation, but I also agree that the work of being a dentist cannot be separated from this man’s character. Hurting children isn’t acceptable; praising the work of those that harm children therefore isn’t acceptable. The person and the action must be judged together in order to protect others from harm. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not arguing here that we should always be pointing fingers, refusing to forgive, or live in constant judgment of others. Life is messy; no one is perfect and all that. I’m all for mercy, but at the same time if people are being hurt it has to be stopped. This man is being held accountable for how he hurt children. I hope he can repent and change and find mercy, but to stop the harm he had to be held accountable. The public outrage at his actions will ensure that he is held accountable in ways that prevent him from doing further harm.

But in a world full of suffering and pain, I find it interesting that there are very few “sins” left anymore that can so completely discredit a person and force the community to hold them accountable for their actions. Sure we might think Charlie Sheen or Mel Gibson are crazy and need help, or shake our heads when we hear of yet another athlete or entertainer who beat up their girlfriend, or admit a pastor’s misogyny might be bit extreme even as we buy his books – but falling out of favor or assuming boys will be boys is not the same as holding people accountable so that they will stop hurting others.

What if businessmen when given achievement awards were held accountable for the abuses committed in their sweatshops they own or for the pollution they have created? Or if “sealing-the-deal” gifts of visits to brothels full of trafficked young women were listed alongside a company’s stocks? Would we be willing to hold those people accountable for hurting others in such ways? Would it affect our respect for the company or whether or not we used their product? We freak out and lynch the dentist caught with child porn or even the pastor who has an affair because such things are close to home, but we continue to give awards and our money to those that abuse workers and sex slaves. So, why the double standard? Isn’t hurting people the same thing no matter who does it or where it takes place?

I was asking myself these questions last week after this story hit the news and found an interesting response to my musings in the words of Newt Gingrich. As he announced his intention to run for president, news stations brought up his controversial quote about Obama where he said that Obama was conning the American people with his anti-colonial Kenyan mindset and was fundamentally out of touch with how the world works. I agreed in part with Gingrich’s assessment, but not for the reasons he intended. In his view a president has to follow the oppressive and colonial ways of the world in order to achieve power and dominance at any cost because that is just the way the world works. Politicians, businessmen, bankers – the power holders in our world today often operate under a different system than the rest of us. They are looked down upon as weak, out of touch, and con-artists if they seek the good of the whole and not just themselves. We assume that they will abuse the environment and their workers, we expect them to visit brothels and sex slaves, we expect them to colonize and destroy – and never have to take responsibility for any of it, even if caught. Some of us have glimmers of hope when we see people in those worlds attempting to subvert those expectations, but we rarely hold such people accountable for hurting others. In fact we reward them for doing so if they manage to benefit us while they are doing it.

It’s obvious that there are people out there who never take responsibility for the hurts they have caused in the world. But what about our responsibility to hold them accountable for their actions? Most of us don’t even want to admit that we contribute to the systems that cause harm, much less speak out in an attempt to put an end to the suffering of others. We are even unsettled and uncomfortable when we have to face the depravity of men like this dentist who now must take responsibility for the harm they caused children. But I think stories like these need to push us to ask these questions – ask why responsibility and accountability are assumed to just not be part of “the way the world works.” And then choose not to be afraid of actually finding answers.

And then I came home and saw the social networks ablaze with the inquisitional fires of the evangelical church jumping at the chance to denounce Rob Bell for his audacity at (supposedly) proclaiming in his upcoming book that in the end love truly does win. From the blog posts dismissing him for his universalism to John Piper’s juvenile tweet of “farewell Rob Bell,” it was hard not to laugh at the absurdity. Here I had spent a weekend having my faith in the church’s ability to actually follow Jesus somewhat restored to only be immediately reminded of the vitriol many in the evangelical world possess for any who don’t buy into their very historically recent and rather scripturally unfounded definition of what it means to be a “biblical Christian.” But what truly got to me was how in how this debate was framed those opposing Bell’s ideas were being forced to claim that in the end God’s love actually doesn’t win. Like Jonah pouting after God didn’t utterly annihilate the people of Nineveh, they are actually defending a system that puts limits on God’s love simply because they want to be the ones with a corner on the truth who get all the goodies in the end. Call it doctrine or dogma or self-centeredness, it simply confounds me that people still continue to argue against the love of God.

What appears to be at the source of the controversy is Bell’s supposed claim that a loving God would never judge anyone to eternity in hell (although since most people –including myself – have not read the book yet, no one really knows if that is what he is actually saying. But check out the YouTube promo video here). So Bell is being called a universalist which in evangelicalese is code for "I'm a heretic who hates the Bible" (or something to that effect). But if Bell is saying what I think he’s saying (and of course I have no idea, but I’m throwing my 2 cents in anyway), he is actually far more in line with traditional orthodox Christian theology than this new-fangled thing called evangelical theology. I’m betting that the position he is asserting is that of a universalist who believes in hell (which is where I’ve found myself landing these days as well).

In this view nothing – not human doctrine nor prejudice – can stand in the way of a God seeking to reconcile all things to godself. God created humans to be in constant relationship with godself – growing ever closer to mirroring the image of God we were created in. We instead chose to attempt to be godlike without God, walking away from God in the process. But God did not reject us. God could have withdrawn from us, casting us away from divine perfection – annihilating us in the process since by nature we could not exist apart from that which we were meant to be in eternal relationship with. Instead God was merciful and simple let us walk away. But like Dante so beautifully portrayed in his Divine Comedy, even as the furthest reaches of hell are frozen over as Satan flaps his wings in a furious attempt to fly further and further away from God, he is still not out of the reach of God’s love. Hell exists, but it is a place of our own creation as we try to flee from God asserting “our will be done” instead of “thy will be done.” God does not condemn us to hell, or cast us out of his presence (which would destroy us); instead God pursues us out of Eden and even into hell, offering the gift of blessing and redemption. We are meant by nature to be in relation with God, created in God’s image our purpose is to bear that image and continually reflect it back to God through our acts of worship in this world. Despite our attempts to flee to the furthest reaches of hell, God still reaches out to us because if we still exist, we are still image-bearers, and God seeks after us to restore the racked icons of our person to godself.

When the historical church couldn’t understand how a person could be forgiven and reconciled to God they declared them an anathema which means that their fate be cast up to a higher court for although it was beyond them how they that person is in Christ he or she could never be beyond God. And if in the consummation of creation all things will be reconciled to God, then unless we want to assert that God rejects and therefore annihilates those who flee from him, we have to believe that in the end God’s relentless pursuit of his beloved results in the actual redemption and reconciliation of all things. In the end all that belongs to God, all that was created in the image of God, will turn away from its rebellion and be reconciled unto God. In short, in the end love wins. Love is not fettered by temporal constraints, or extended only to the workers that arrived early in the day. We were created to be in relationship with God, and it is the return to that state of theosis where we can participate in the covenant where we are blessed to extend God’s blessing to the world that God desires for us.

I saw a glimmer of a church that got that with the Salvation Army this past weekend – a group of passionate followers of Jesus taking seriously the call to end the injustices that stand in the way of the blessing and reconciling of the world. They know, in their own peculiar way, that love wins. So instead of trying to put limits on God’s ability to redeem creation and pouting about wanting to be the only ones the divine lover chooses to pursue, maybe we can start acting as if God really does rule the universe. Maybe we can accept the gift of God's love and instead of selfishly keeping it all to ourselves we live into our identity as blessed icons and give that love away.

While I understand the need for discussion whether the release of these cables might endanger some people, I am uneasy condemning them simply because they reveal the embarrassing sins of the United States. In our country we have forgotten that social sin does indeed exist. Governments are not above morality and justice, but sadly often have the power and wealth to hide their sins from the judging eyes of the world. When all the people see is the façade the government constructs for themselves (while being sold the message that unquestioning patriotism is the highest virtue), it is easy for governments to avoid responsibility and accountability for their actions.
I don’t believe innocence is bliss. If my government is committing injustices or betraying the ideals of our nation, then the people who they supposedly report to should know about it. We are the only ones who can hold governments responsible – if we abdicate that role or if it is denied to us then government sin can abound.

But no one likes being called out on their sins. When John the Baptist called out Herod on his sinful ways, he was beheaded to shut him up. Intimidation and fear are the governments’ tools for keeping truth suppressed so they can continue to avoid responsibility. Amazon already gave into the pressure to be silenced, Julian Assange (WikiLeak’s founder) is currently in hiding, and the public is being told that revealing the truth is an act of terrorism. We are made to feel guilty for knowing the truth instead of the government owning up to those truths and taking responsibility for them.

Government is complex, I get that. But that doesn’t mean that it is exempt from morality. Perhaps WikiLeaks is the martyr that will wake us up to the need to hold our government to those basic standards of morality.

Confession is admission, recognition, declaration, and agreement that we have participated in the wrong order of things – in ways that don't further the Shalom of God. And then we repent and say we want to return to the order that God wants.

The definition of confession that I have always heard restricts it to admitting particular sins. You told a lie, you confess it. But that view of confession doesn't truly cover all the ways we have participated in the disruption of true Shalom. It makes confession all about us and an easy checklist of dos and don'ts instead of our relationship with God and others and our call to participate in the kingdom of God.

For example, when we participate in systems that support injustices in the world we are disrupting Shalom. I would never go so far as to say that buying a banana grown by oppressed workers and with dangerous polluting pesticides is a sin in the traditional understanding of the word, but it is a failure to love and a disruption of the way things ought to be. So we can confess that we have participated in the wrong order of things, failed to support God's Shalom, and then choose to return (repent) to the order of love and stewardship that God desires. It's not about acts of individual sin, it's about an orientation of love.

But it is also not about guilt. Admitting, recognizing, declaring, and agreeing (confessing according to this definition) that these acts of oppression and pollution exist and that we are participants in them is not meant to make people feel guilty but to establish the impetus for change. Unless we admit that there is a problem, then things can never return to the way they should be. All too often those of us who talk about the need to confess our cultural sins (as with purchasing unfairly made items or benefiting from the past slavery of others) are accused of just wanting people to feel guilty. But in truth guilt should have nothing to do with this. Confession comes from a desire to serve God and see his will done. We may yes, feel bad or sorry for our actions, but change comes from positive vision not negative feelings.

This perspective on confession is bigger and messier than we might be used to, but it better reflects the way God desires us to be. It is harder to think of life holistically and attempt to orient ourselves to living out the Shalom of God, but I think it is more reflective of truth and results in deeper commitments to the way of Christ.