So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, good night

For my final blog - the end of my story this past semester - I think I might talk about Revelation. It is interesting that a few girls and I started a morning Bible study once a week focused solely on Revelation just a few weeks before we started going over it in class. It's a shame, I wish we had had more time with it in class.

Revelation is another of those topics most of us just skim past. We read it and think, "Well...that was interesting...maybe I'll read the uplifting chapter of Jesus' birth again." One of the reasons I find Revelation so perplexing is that it is a story yet to unfold. Nearly the entirety of the Bible is history, a future that became the present then to become the past. However, as we have discussed in class, there are many speculations about the truths and facts of the Bible, but it is made quite clear by the writers that the stories they tell are meant to have happened already. But in Revelation, none of it has happened yet. It is a book so unique and unlike any other within the Bible. My friends and I have been studying it for five or six weeks now (having had to take a break over Thanksgiving) and are only in the fourth chapter. After reading almost every sentence we all have to dive into the footnotes of our Bibles trying to explain that which we do not understand - which is nearly all of it. Yesterday we read Revelation 4:5-8:

Before the throne, seven lamps were blazing. These are the seven spirits[a] of God. 6Also before the throne there was what looked like a sea of glass, clear as crystal.
In the center, around the throne, were four living creatures, and they were covered with eyes, in front and in back. 7The first living creature was like a lion, the second was like an ox, the third had a face like a man, the fourth was like a flying eagle. 8Each of the four living creatures had six wings and was covered with eyes all around, even under his wings.

Uh..huh. Everything in Revelation is a symbol for something else! The seven lamps stand for one thing, the seven spirtis another. The lion, the ox, the man, and the eagle each represent something different. That part was rather frustrating. My roommate's footnotes indicated that they all stood for one thing (things like domesticated animals, wild animals, etc) whereas my Bible said they stood for entirely different things (such as sovereignty, strength, etc)! After an hour of what felt like a treasure hunt - one verse footnote referring us to another in the OT which referred us to another in a different book which brought us back to the one in Revelation, etc ect ect... - It was never ending! We finally had to resign ourselves to the fact that the future is all speculation. Our race yearns to understand everything, to have an explination for every question out there. But the fact is, we never will. As an imperfect race formed from God's perfection, no matter how hard we try, we will never be able to fully understand him. At least not in this world. It'll be interesting to see what comes. What the future brings. After this semester of intensive study, frustratingly unanswerable questions and paradoxes, and awesome discovery, I am content to sit back and simply enjoy the ride...what more can I do?

Term Paper - God's Wrath: A Tangible Love

Intro: I really enjoyed writing this paper. For a while I dreaded it because I had so many ideas floating around in my head, I didn't think I'd manage organizing it all into a nice and neat paper. While that did prove difficult, it was interesting to see how my paper changed beneath my fingertips from what I had planned on writing to what actually came out of my printer. I learned a lot from writing it, and hope that it came out intelligibly enough.

Last week, I was infected with what Dr. Killeen called a “common cold,” but I could swear I had the black plague itself. My throat was tight and constantly burning as if I swallowed flaming razor sharp toothpicks. I could not breathe to save my life. My muscles were so soar that each cough that shook my body caused me more pan than I felt I could ever have deserved. My roommate came into my room every now and then to check on me. And each time, there she found me, curled up in bed, waiting for death to take me. I wondered what I could have done to have brought such a truly terrible illness upon myself. But lying there, I started thinking of my oldest sister, who has had two cancer scares in her lifetime, and she is only 25 years old. I thought of my grandmother whose death to throat cancer took her from me before I was even old enough to remember what she looked like. I thought of my childhood friend, T.J. whose mother died when he was in the fifth grade. He would live the majority of his life motherless. Then my depression turned from myself to all those individuals who are closest to me. This mere cold was nothing compared to what they had endured. Comparatively, it would seem God has blessed me with a much more fortunate and easy-going life. But my thoughts were not doing me any good. There are others, far more important than me, who could use faithful prayer. As I lay there, contemplating darkness, sickness, and death, I felt a certain bitterness slowly grow within me. It is not fair – none of it. Why should anyone experience pain at all in life? I picked up my Bible lying on the floor beside my bed. I figured it was about time I got to work on my Foundations of Biblical Literature paper, or to at least write another blog entry or two. I was trying to find connections between Singer’s The Slave and the Bible; but the more research I did the more God’s wrath slapped me across the face. Growing up in Sunday school, I had heard all the staple Bible stories: the fall of man, the Great Flood, the ten Plagues. But something we as Christians often tend to do is look past the wrathful God evident in these stories to create a more beautiful and loving God. In this way, we can sleep better at night. But, as my head throbbed achingly from constant coughing attacks, I decided finally that I could no longer ignore God’s terrifying wrath. There must be a good reason, justification for the sin that infects the world and for God’s terrible reaction to it.

I figured that the best place to start is at the beginning, in the Garden of Eden. With Adam and Eve, we had everything. God gave mankind all he could have possibly wanted and needed to be happy. The Garden was so perfect that not even the slightest knowledge of evil entered there. God laid all his cards on the table, keeping nothing from us. Speaking to his first son and daughter of creation, he told them the rules of his kingdom, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.” (Gen 2:16-17) It was as simple as that. God’s one rule. But when Eve and Adam partook of the forbidden fruit, they took God’s rules, his mercy, his grace, and threw it all back in his face. He was honest and open with us and we took it for granted. We messed up. Just as in a parent/child relationship, when the parent is disobeyed, he or she has the full right to punish that child. It is not because of a malicious heart that punishment ensues, but because of a heart brimming of love. Punishment is meant to teach the child that what they did was wrong, so that they may turn from their wrong ways. However, at the time, the child – in his immaturity and ignorance – may not completely understand the parents’ good intensions. And so it is with God. He gave us the rules and we rebelled so he is punishing us with death. He is perfectly justified to do so because mankind ate of the fruit knowing full well what consequence it would bring upon the world. But what I find most beautiful about this story is that it does not end with death. Despite mankind’s betrayal, God still loves his creation and has offered life to compensate for death. “See, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil; and now, he might reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life, and eat, and live forever.” (Gen 3:22) In a simplified sense, God turns a big, fat frown upside-down for our sake and nothing else. In this instance, I find God wholly justified. His actions are clear and sensible. But that line of justification begins to blur as we get further into the Old Testament.

We first see God’s wrath when he floods the world, killing nearly every soul upon it. When I heard this story I wondered how every single living being could have possibly been so corrupt that death by universal drowning was necessary. But, and may you forgive me for saying so, even if they were righteous, because of the forbidden fruit incident in the Garden of Eden, death is deserved nevertheless. No matter how it might be served, it will be fulfilled. Luckily, God is a merciful God giving us second chances to make up for our mistakes. And that is exactly what he does now. “The Lord saw that the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually […] ‘I will blot out from the earth the human beings I have created’ […] But Noah found favor in the sight of the Lord.” (Gen 6:5-8) Noah, the most deserving of God’s grace, is given life before it could be taken away. And thus, the whole of humanity was given life. That is the misconception, with this great act God gave us back life; he did not take it away. It is the same with Sodom and Gomorrah as well. The Lord promised, “for the sake of ten [he] will not destroy it” (Gen 18:32). But not even one was worthy of life any longer. Yet, even now, as I write out the words, I feel as if I must be some heartless, blood-thirsty psycho to justify the death of hundreds of thousands of people. And three months ago I am sure I would have condemned myself as such, but as I have studied the Old Testament more thoroughly I am finding the exact opposite. Despite how it may seem, God is just.

Even ordering the ten plagues against Pharaoh and his Egyptians, God was acting within his just freedom. Though, it does seem shamelessly malicious to order Moses to plead with Pharaoh but then to “harden his heart, so that he will not let the people go” (Ex 4:21). I had a harder time finding an excuse for this behavior. But the editors of The Harper Collins Study Bible explain that “the hardening prolongs the plagues and ensures that Egypt will suffer the punishment it deserves and witness the Lord’s power” (footnote Ex 4:21). I had forgotten that Egypt had deserved punishment, enslaving the Israelites and throwing every newborn Hebrew son into the Nile. And further more, God wished the world to know his power. Well, he can check that one off the list; here we are, thousands of years later discussing in a Biblical Literature class God’s awesome power. It is not unlike the bombing of Hiroshima, after which President Truman announced, “If they do not now accept our terms, they may expect a rain of ruin from the air the likes of which has never been seen on this earth” (“Rain of Ruin”). And again in Leviticus 26 God explains what it is he asks of his people, just as he did for Adam and Eve. He demands their obedience and in return will reward them accordingly. He also warns that if they are to rebel against him, breaking his covenant, then he shall punish them until they repent. It is not that he wishes to watch his creation suffer, but because he has given us free will it is not in his way to work against that. He is simply a father attempting to hold his children safely in his arms once more.

Upon reading The Slave, I found the idea of Jacob’s slavery to his religion intriguing. The anonymous ferryman who Jacob encounters later on in the novel advises that one should never “get attached to anything. You own a cow or a horse and you’re its slave.” (The Slave 259) But then Jacob replies that man cannot be entirely free” (The Slave 260). I paused shortly after reading this statement. No man is ever completely free. We always want something, and whatever it is that we most desire we become a sort of slave to. With this in mind, it would seem to me that the only desire to have that could possibly give you freedom is desire for God. In Romans, Paul explains that before receiving Christ, we were all slaves to sin. But “having been set free from sin, [we] have become slaves of righteousness” (Romans 6:18). With mankind’s history, the term “slave” does not carry a very honorable or pleasant connotation. However, being the perceptive man that Paul is, he further explains:

I am speaking in human terms because of your natural limitations.
For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to greater
and greater iniquity, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness
for sanctification. (Romans 6:19)

God is incomprehensible. No matter
how much we try, mankind will never completely know him as long as we are in this life. Our human standards form a vast wall between us and the Father of creation.

For instance, in the book of Job, Eliphaz, Bildad, Zophar, and Elihu, Job’s “friends,” arrive to counsel him in his difficult times. All four adopt the theory of retributive justice or, as many like to call it, karma. It is the idea that if one is righteous and blameless he will receive a reword accordingly. But if one receives punishment and heartache, it must be because his life is evidence of deserving such a consequence. Unfortunately, these men have let their insignificant human standards block the way for God to speak truth in their hearts. Despite everything, Job is able to see the wrong beneath their words “having heard of [God] by the hearing of the ear” and now seeing with eyes unclouded (Job 42:5). Life is constantly filled with such misinterpretations. What seems to be injustice or slavery or even karma is in reality a gift given by grace.

In Matthew 20:1-17 Jesus tells a parable of laborers in a vineyard. The story goes that a landowner agrees to pay his workers their usual daily wage, with which they are satisfied. But when he pays men who worked far less laboriously an equal amount as those who worked hard all day, there is an uproar. Many think it unfair for both sets of workers to receive the same wages. But the landowner defends himself, questioning the workers, “Am I not allowed to do what I choose with what belongs to me? Or are you envious because I am generous?” (Mt 20:15) Just as with this worker, salvation is God’s gift to mankind. We do not deserve it by any means, but it has been an agreement between us and the divine Creator that in return for repentance of our sins he will grant us eternal life in heaven. So what right do we have to complain if others are blessed with seemingly better circumstances? We all receive our own blessings and curses in turn. But it is simply easier for us to judge our lives in comparison to others’. In doing so, over time we have adopted this sense of entitlement, as though we are worthy of God’s love at all. But what we must remember is that a gift is “something given voluntarily, bestowed or acquired without its being earned” (dictionary.com). Not one man that has ever lived, nor does live, nor ever will deserves God’s gift of salvation. Time and time again we turn away from God, but he is always there to lead us back to the light of his righteousness.

There is a verse in Romans chapter four which states, “against all hope, in hope believe.” It is God’s faithfulness that gives me hope enough to keep trekking on in life. Elihu himself admits that God “does great things that we cannot comprehend” (Job 37:5). But just as believers avoid the fact of God’s wrath, so do many nonbelievers focus on that very subject. If I am going to call myself a follower of God, I must be open to every part of him, especially his anger. It has been difficult, but facing this controversial topic throughout this semester has helped me tremendously. I can now see and identify with others’ point of views in a light I never before wished to attempt. I even have a better understanding of my own personal view. Previously, when I had ignored one of the grand themes of the Old Testament – God’s rage- I lacked a vital part of my faith: understanding. But now, having tackled a topic that is even still difficult for me to accept, I have gained strength in the knowledge that it is okay to question ones beliefs. In fact it is healthy to do so, because it is a good sign that knowledge is still being sought. And as long as I am yearning to know more, I am confident that I will never succumb to the pressures of the world to be anything different than I really am.

Human Standards

I've been thinking more and more about this human standards idea. There's this youtube video I remember my friends raving about last year. It's this tragic love story between a father and his son. There comes a point when the father has to choose wether or not he will sacrifice his son to save a train full of people. I'm even watching it right now as I'm writing this, and seeing the father's grief after losing his son is absolutely heart wrenching. So, I think we can all make the connection to the story of God and the sacrifice he made for us. The video may be a little cheezy but for whatever reason, it seems to tug at my heart every time.

But I found it interesting that we hear the story of Jesus' sacrifice and think, "wow. Well that's cool" but that's about it. We don't feel any real emotional attachment to the story. We don't fully comprehend the enormity of it. So the best, most effective way to elicit an emotional response from us is to create a video, such as this one, we can relate to by our human standards. And that's all well and good for the believers.

But for non believers, there's also a difference. The cheezy video for them, too, is more realistic and easy to relate to. But the story of God sacrificing his son? Eh, no thanks. So what is is about the story of Jesus' sacrifice that's so much harder to accept, on any level? Hm, well, I'm just going to blame it on our restrictive human standards. That seems like the easiest way to go.

Here's the video of the father and his son, it really is quite good: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UR7-fd3Lus4

New Discoveries

As I have been working on my term paper, I found some more interesting things. I'll be honest and admit that I never completely finished the book of Job. But it is one of the focuses of my term paper so I figured I'd better at least read it from beginning to end. Doing so, I came across a passage that I found, in a sense, spellbinding. It's one of Elihu's many ramblings. And I know we're not supposed to like him as he's one of Job's "frenemies," but I can't help but love the metaphors of this particular passage. It's his speech in Job 36:26-37:13. I'd recommend that you read it, but it may not speak to you the way it does to me.

In it Elihu praises God's wondrous power to control the atmosphere. "Listen to the roar of his voice, to the rumbling that comes from his mouth" (Job 37:2). For Elihu, and for most of us, this is the closest we will ever come to actually hearing God's voice. He does not speak directly to us any longer, like the God of the Old Testament. I think it's a wonderful metaphor Elihu makes for God's voice; the thunder of the skies seems like the best substitute (at least for the limited mental capacity of our human minds) for such a majestic being.

In Revelation, John attempts to describe a physical manifestation of the Son's second coming:

"His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were like blazing fire. His feet were like bronze glowing in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of rushing waters." (Revelation 1:14-15)

I'd like to see you try to describe a man like this in today's day and age, "I'm telling you, man! His voice was like the sound of rushing waters! Rushing freakin' waters!!" You'd pretty much sound crazy. But I'm sure that "rushing waters" don't even come close to what God's voice would really sound like to our human ears.

Elihu's speech puts it into perspective how powerful God is, just in the fact that we can't even illustrate by metaphor how truly awesome he is, because our human standards simply cannot comprehend...

term paper

So I was in church this morning and we're currently going over the ten plagues in Exodus. Our pastor tackled a tricky subject this week - justification for God hardening the Pharaoh's heart. He referred us to Romans 9:14-18:

"14What then shall we say? is God unjust? Not at all! 15For he says to Moses, 'I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.' 16It does not, therefore, depend on man's desire or effort, but on God's mercy. 17For the Scripture says to Pharaoh: 'I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display my power in you and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth.' 18Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden."

That's a hard pill to swallow. I think half the congregation had a big, fat, ugly grimace on their face right about this point. But then Pastor Brian had us turn to Matthew 20:13-15 - a parable Jesus tells where workers are all paid the same amount of money even though they did not work the same number of hours. The men that got up at 6am and worked all day got the same pay as the lazy men that slept in and didn't start working till 5pm. When the early risers complained the employer answered,

"13Friend, I am not being unfair to you. Didn't you agree to work for a denarius? 14Take your pay and go. I want to give the man who was hired last the same as I gave you. 15Don't I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous?"

Pastor Brian elaborated that our salvation is a gift from God. A gift is not something that we deserve nor is it something that anyone is obligated to give. We've developed this sort of entitlement mentality, turning the gift of salvation into a business transaction. What Jesus is saying is that we are lucky to receive God's grace at all. If he chooses not to give it to the Pharaoh so that he may further his Kingdom, then that is his freedom to do so. It is his freedom that guards his grace.

Now, I say all this because this really got me thinking about the upcoming term paper. I had unofficially decided to write my paper on The Slave - for obvious links to the wonderful book of Job. But that just seemed kind of boring to me... It's such a blatantly obvious connection. But one thing that I really wondered about while reading The Slave, was how Jacob found justification in the punishment he seemed to be getting from God when he was such a faithful follower. Up until his romp in the woods with Wanda, he was incredibly loyal to God - even afterwards he still maintained an astounding faith in the Lord. It honestly made me feel ashamed. I sin, then feel guilty, then sin again because of the original sin I committed. It's a vicious cycle that pulls me farther and farther away from God. But yet I still see his grace in my life every day. The fact that I'm free, that I'm studying here at MSU, that I have friends to hang out with over the weekend and a family to return to for Thanksgiving and Christmas are all signs of his grace. I wonder why he chose to give me this gift. And why he put Jacob through such difficult trials. I don't think I'll ever be able to understand an incomprehensible God, but I just might try...

eureka

All righty, so I was just doing some late night reading before going to bed, working my way through Job. I was reading in chapter eight when Bildad instructs Job on exactly what he thinks Job ought to do, the ol' "well if I were you I'd..." shpeel. And I started to get frustrated thinking, "Well, you know what, Bildad? You're not Job. Let's take away every thing you hold near and dear to your heart and see if you thank and praise God quite so easily. Why don't you just take a seat and shutup." Okay, so maybe that's a bit harsh (it is rather passed my bed time). But I came to Job's defense. No one can know just how they will react to any given situation. Sure we'd all LIKE to think we would praise God ceaselessly, but the reality of it is that's not very likely...at all. But, this, of course, we all know, so on to my point. (It's odd, but I find myself getting worked up about this, and even in my blog I babble on and on about how ridiculous it is.)

I didn't get very far into the reading when I realized that I'm so defensive of him because he's a normal man. He's your next door neighbor, Phil. He's merely a decent guy trying to get by in life and live as righteously as possible, so that when he gets to Heaven, God may say, "Well done, good and faithful servant." Now THAT is the icing of the oreo. Professor Sexson keeps talking about this oreo cookie like it's some magical, wonderful thing. But to me, it's just been a plain ol' oreo. Sure, I suppose it makes for a good metaphor, so I'd jot it down in my notes, then start doodling little oreos and other various dessert items all over my notebook while half listening to Prof. Sexson talk about icing and crust and prologue and epilogue and half daydreaming about food...(Sorry, Professor Sexson, I don't really mean it, I'm just trying to make a point. I actually find your class quite riveting!) But then, just now, after all this time and all the stories we've gone over, I've finally figured it out. Everything I've been missing in Sunday school, with their connect the dots worksheets and mini dramatizations and dumb felt boards - it was the icing! Job was an ordinary man, it's not natural for man to endure such pain and loss effortlessly. Yet in the end, he says to the Lord:

"I know that you can do all things [...] Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know. You said, 'Listen now, and I will speak; I will question you, and you shall answer me.' My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you." -Job 42:2-5

Beautiful. The oreo ends taste so much better with the icing in the middle, don't they?

Well, now that I'm practically drooling all over my computer with all this cookie talk, I can return to bed satisfied.

Ballet vs Heavy Metal

I liked the Stevens poem well enough, much better the second or third time around though. But it is really the first and fourth parts that I find most captivating. I think the first stanza is beautiful. "Just as my fingers on these keys make music, so the self-same sounds on my spirit make a music, too." It's wonderful. These lines alone give me this strange sort of feeling deep in my chest (I mean this quite literally). I didn't know what it was or where it came from. But it felt something like hope. Now, I'm not trying to be all "deep" or anything. It truly surprised me. If this mysterious feeling is one of hope, then what is it that I feel so hopeless about? I'm still not sure, but I can make a few guesses... Perhaps it gives me hope that such romantic language isn't lost - I know that the poem was published back in 1915, but I'm reading it in 2009 and it is hard for me to accept that the world can get lost in a language consisted of "yo," "like," and "roflmao" losing the beauty it once held in "just as my fingers on these keys make music..." Call me a nerd, but I love watching "Dancing with the Stars" to see couples perform the fox trot and waltz, etc. Whereas today's "bump-n'-grind" I find revolting. I'm more of an old fashioned type of person in some ways I suppose, and these lines ignited that old fashioned flame within me. But after the first couple stanzas, the poem is no longer a favorite of mine. The elders really creep me out.

Aside from the actual language of "Peter Quince at the Clavier," this idea that music is everywhere reminded me of a day when my two sisters and I were climbing into the back seat of my parents’ van. On my right, Emily was trying to buckle her seatbelt but it kept getting stuck. Every time she tugged on the strap she let out a little gasp from all the effort it took, making an “eh…eh…eh…” sound. I was in the middle also trying to buckle my seatbelt, but it wouldn’t clasp. Every time the metal tip tapped against the metal of the buckle it made a clinking sound, “tink…tink…tink…” And on my right, Kristin was trying to close a small storage compartment so that she could use it as an arm rest, but it wouldn’t stay shut. So she kept slamming the lid hoping the force would shut it, naturally it never did, “slam…slam…slam…” After a short while we noticed our parents staring at us from the front of the car. Apparently, we made a sort of beat or rhythm from these frustrating things that didn’t even work. “eh tink slam, eh tink slam, eh tink slam” We all started to laugh at the absurdity of the moment. To be honest, it’s one of the few times I can remember us all laughing together like that. Not that we were often cold to one another, but it seemed like there was always somebody not getting along with somebody else.

Though Stevens doesn’t mean to say that actual music is everywhere (“Music is feeling, then, not sound”), this memory in my mind now plays a certain tune to me - a happy one, one that you might play to cheer somebody up. Each memory I have is a different tune. Some of them are loud, dark, and frightening pieces, but then there are the lighter ballets that make all the rest ok. In my mind light is stronger than darkness, though sometimes it’s hard to remember that.

So I suppose I must disagree with Stevens here. Beauty is not “momentary in the mind – the fitful tracing of a portal; but in the flesh it is immortal.” I think it is extremely important to remember that in our minds we can hold everything beautiful, so that when things do turn dark, we can always recall those moments and pieces of light.