Comments on: Will the Real Jesus Please Stand Up?

By: josh

josh — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 01:41:41 +0000

Too many comments have passed. Wow. I appreciate the good diaolog, especially when it is spirited. I would address Beck’s comments if the text assigned that week called for it. OC is a place that does not trust overtly gestures to either party. That is, if you are going to make a comment politically, you’d better come strong, with strong logic/evidence.

By: josh

josh — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 01:06:08 +0000

Somehow, I totally missed this entire conversation happening on the blog. Wow. I will read through and comment. Love the energy and passion.

PS I think Glenn Beck is dead wrong. I think if he met Jesus he’d be really really really surprised.

By: rjohns

rjohns — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 22:00:14 +0000

Hi Tim,

A few questions, because I don’t want to misunderstand you:

(1) What do you mean by “Justice?”

and

(2) How do we go about bringing the Kingdom of God here?

And finally:

(3) Aren’t there enough examples of Jesus serving (or dining with) those who were not poor and not on the fringes to conclude that his method was not to seek out the fringe-dwellers? For example, Zacchaeus, Nicodemus, Joseph of Arimathea, Levi, Saul or Tarsus, the rich young man, etc.?

By: Tim

Tim — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 21:31:26 +0000

Yes on c of C.

Off the top of my head I would say Matt. 25 and the judgement scene. I know we tend to parable-ize this story. I’m not saying that Christ’s #1 reason for coming to earth wasn’t to seek and save the lost but his METHOD seemed to be to serve those who were most on the fringes, and in doing that, he won their hearts, and souls! I do think our job is to bring the Kingdom of God HERE as much as we can, but I realize this world is BROKEN and a poor copy of the original.
There is a tension between these issues, but I no longer believe that the NT is simply about my personal salvation and believing that God has little concern for the Justice we enact here and now.

By: rjohns

rjohns — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 03:50:41 +0000

Tim,

Also…you are not an OC’er? Just wondering…are you CoC? I am formerly CoC but not now.

By: rjohns

rjohns — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 03:49:25 +0000

If we know that someone is being abused, I think we should definitely speak up or abstain from buying a product. I guess Jesus might have spoken out about such things, although I don’t think it is true that he spent a huge amount of time laying “the poor’s plight at the feet of their rich oppressors.” He seemed more concerned with people’s inner spiritual state (i.e. whether or not they were repentant and put God first) and with training his immediate disciples. I don’t get the impression from reading the NT that Jesus was a social justice crusader.

Also, from what I can recall, most of the people he called out were people who were spiritually (not necessarily economically) oppressing others, namely the Pharisees, scribes, etc. There are *some* examples of people being economically oppressed, but it seems there’s usually other spiritual issues at stake there too. One example I can think of is the money-changers in the temple. They were forcing people to pay temple fees with special coinage, and thus people had to have their currency converted, and in the process they would gouge them. Also, I’ve heard some say the area of the temple they were using was supposed to be an outer court for the Gentiles to worship in, and they were unable to do so because of the presence of the money-changers.

Maybe I’ve missed some. Give me some scripture examples of what you mean and we could discuss them.

By: Tim

Tim — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 16:51:44 +0000

Josh, don’t know if this relates to this discussion but what are your thoughts on Glenn Becks comments this week about churches and social justice? Is this a topic you would address from the pulpit (I’m not a OCer so I have no dog in this hunt..hah)