40 - Nonviolence and the Paradox of the Christian Witness

Speaker 1: 0:20

Welcome to Theology in Pieces where we hope to rebuild your theology that the church, the world or somebody has shattered pieces, with your host, slim and Malcolm.

Speaker 2: 0:29

Well, hey, what's up y'all? You may have not recognized that voice, but you know we're coming in like a big deal. We now have interns that don't necessarily work for the podcast but are volunteering for the church, and we're putting them to use at work. So that was Caroline. Thanks, Caroline.

Speaker 1: 0:53

Thanks, caroline.

Speaker 2: 0:55

But yes, hey, this is Theology Pieces and we're glad you're here. We hope it's not been too long. We're settling in to 2024, malcolm.

Speaker 1: 1:04

Yep.

Speaker 2: 1:05

You finally feel ready? Do you feel like this is?

Speaker 1: 1:09

Ready for the year.

Speaker 2: 1:10

For the storm, one of my symbols ready for the election cycle. One of my symbols ready for Slim. You better get ready because it's about to happen.

Speaker 1: 1:24

That's true, it is about to happen.

Speaker 2: 1:28

And what it is is now up to you. Now, what we're going to talk about today is this fun topic of non-violence, and in light of that topic, before we get into the meat of our discussion, I want to ask you a very, very serious question. Malcolm yes, and I know you've been praying in your prayer closet and thinking hard about things like this. If you were to declare war on something totally ridiculous, what would it be?

Speaker 1: 1:59

I don't know why. The first thing that came to mind when you asked that question was pineapple on pizza.

Speaker 2: 2:04

Oh yes.

Speaker 1: 2:05

But it's an abomination.

Speaker 2: 2:07

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 2:07

And.

Speaker 2: 2:09

Do you have a story of when you no?

Speaker 1: 2:13

like I really honestly don't know why. The first thing that came to mind when you said that was that particular thing. I literally have no idea why that just happened.

Speaker 2: 2:24

People are declaring war on Christmas and you're declaring war on pineapple pizza or just sweet thing.

Speaker 1: 2:31

Pizza's not supposed to be sweet. It's a thing with what's the perfect pizza. I also don't like so. For example, some people put apple with their pork recipes and I'm just not a.

Speaker 2: 2:45

I don't mix sweet and meat it's just not sweet, and meat it's not my jam. Do you do barbecue sauce? I mean kind of Did I just ruin your life, kind of. Maybe I don't register barbecue sauce as sweet in my line I would say fruit and meat. Maybe, yeah, okay, we're having to think this through Is there an example where we like fruit and the meat together. What would you declare war on?

Speaker 1: 3:16

Christmas is one you wanted to declare war on Christmas.

Speaker 2: 3:22

CRT is another.

Speaker 1: 3:24

Okay, so we're winning, so far, we're winning.

Speaker 2: 3:31

Who's the we?

Speaker 1: 3:33

I don't know.

Speaker 2: 3:36

I like asking the questions more than answering them.

Speaker 1: 3:38

Here's another one.

Speaker 2: 3:40

If you were to lead an army of penguins into battle, what would your battle cry be?

Speaker 1: 3:50

Where do you get these questions? I was like I was some good icebreaker questions related to violence and war.

Speaker 2: 3:57

These are what I came with.

Speaker 1: 3:59

An army of penguins. Oh, there's that. There's nothing but loss in the future of that.

Speaker 2: 4:07

This is all terrible. Nothing of substance so far in this podcast Are we allowed to? I think you've publicly shared Elise, so I guess we're allowed to go there. Last week we talked about your book has been submitted.

Speaker 1: 4:20

Yes.

Speaker 2: 4:21

And this week.

Speaker 1: 4:22

The edits are currently in front of me.

Speaker 2: 4:24

Edits are in place. They said everything is perfect, make no changes.

Speaker 1: 4:28

Nope, that is not what was said. I would like that to have been what was said.

Speaker 2: 4:34

But what is it that people can be looking forward to? What is this title?

Speaker 1: 4:37

Ah, yes.

Speaker 2: 4:39

People might want to Google in bookmark.

Speaker 1: 4:41

This book. So be ready, because it'll likely be available for pre-order in July, and the current title of the book is as follows I should have my drum roll ready.

Speaker 2: 4:57

Yeah, get it ready, man. Okay, one of these days, one of these days? Come on, man. I still don't know where it's at.

Speaker 1: 5:04

The people are waiting, slim, the people are waiting. There we go, okay, and the title of the book is the anti-greed gospel Subtitle why the love of money is the root of racism and how the church can create a new way forward. So keep an eye out for the anti-greed gospel in the coming months. It's coming.

Speaker 2: 5:27

That sounds awesome.

Speaker 1: 5:29

It's coming for you and it's coming to create revolution in your churches.

Speaker 2: 5:32

That sounds awesome, I'm excited.

Speaker 1: 5:35

Me too man.

Speaker 2: 5:37

Now I'm already going to hear the detractors. You know, pause it.

Speaker 1: 5:42

The haters.

Speaker 2: 5:45

Wait, so you're putting forth a gospel other than the one that Paul preached.

Speaker 1: 5:49

Yeah, man, that's actually the one that it actually is the one that Paul preached, and Jesus. They talk about greed a lot, a lot more than most American Christians do. So, I'm going to try to solve that issue.

Speaker 2: 6:06

That's fun.

Speaker 1: 6:08

I will argue. In the book I think I am used to especially coming, especially being raised in reformed contexts. I'm used to thinking about pride as the queen of the vices. I am now coming to the conclusion that actually greed is the queen of the vices. Yeah, yeah, just interesting stuff.

Speaker 2: 6:31

More to come in this book. Well, I'm excited man, Me too. The anti-greed gospel.

Speaker 1: 6:35

The anti-greed gospel. Yes, it's coming.

Speaker 2: 6:38

Love it. You know it's time for.

Speaker 1: 6:41

What time is it?

Speaker 2: 6:42

It's your favorite time, Malcolm.

Speaker 1: 6:43

My favorite time.

Speaker 2: 6:44

Oh, it's your favorite time. It is time for Little.

Speaker 1: 6:48

Terrible.

Speaker 2: 6:49

Tweets.

Speaker 1: 6:50

There we go, let's do it. What foolishness do you have for us today, slim?

Speaker 2: 6:56

Oh, can't you believe it? Can you believe it? Today's terrible tweet comes from none other than our good friend Denny Burke. Oh, great, wonderful have you met, denny.

Speaker 1: 7:09

I haven't.

Speaker 2: 7:10

Oh.

Speaker 1: 7:10

Den, I haven't my DV, sorry, oh no, I haven't. Denny says what does he say?

Speaker 2: 7:22

He's quoting from an article that we'll go into. Okay, faithful men know how to resist unfaithful men. Okay, good shepherds are willing to fight wolves, Okay, but faithful men struggle to resist unfaithful women. And then he links an article from theamericanreformerorg, and the article is titled Empathy, Feminism and the Church by Joseph Rigney.

Speaker 1: 7:46

Oh, Joe Rigney.

Speaker 2: 7:48

And the image that is put forth is the image of Perseus, Greek God.

Speaker 2: 7:54

Yeah holding Medusa's head, holding Medusa's head with the insides of her neck kind of flowing out, and this article is like it's absurd. It is so, so bad. So Empathy, feminism and the Church. He's in a sense saying like we need to behead feminism. And so the title, the subtitle here goes Women's Ordination is Indeed a Watershed Issue, and he talks about how dangerous and destructive and sinful empathy can be and how empathy is a war that is being waged against men and the church.

Speaker 1: 8:49

Yeah, Rigney went viral with this kind of thing months ago, have you noticed? Empathy being terrible.

Speaker 2: 8:56

Empathy ruining our church, Malcolm. I would prefer our church. Not be empathetic is what I would prefer, right.

Speaker 1: 9:06

Well, I mean what Rigney appears to be warning us against is Look at you being nice, look at you. Empathy run wild, which is not like. It's not actually a thing, like whatever he's talking about is not actually a thing.

Speaker 2: 9:23

How does empathy run wild.

Speaker 1: 9:25

You've said the article. You gotta tell me the article. I didn't prep for this, but I do know what of the things that Rigney has said in the past, and also I mean this whole back and forth thing.

Speaker 2: 9:49

Yeah, I mean he says things in here. He says in modern context, empathy is frequently, as one author puts it, the skies for anxiety, a power tool in the hands of the sensitive. So, as you just said, maybe he's trying to fight against empathy run rampant, and I personally have not seen empathy run rampant to be. That's the problem that we need to deal with as a church. I've personally seen the opposite be true. It's been settings in which there seems to be a clear lack of empathy and therefore people are making cold, hard decisions which feel absent of the Holy Spirit. And I'm not saying being empathetic is being filled with the Spirit, but I would say not being empathetic would be a sign that the Spirit has left the room.

Speaker 1: 10:41

So here's his. I think it's important for us to address what's being said. So he says in this article my basic contention is that, running beneath the ideological conflict surrounding all things quote, woke, unquote and explains what those things are, these things that are woke Race, sexuality, abuse and LGBTQ plus is a common emotional dynamic involving untethered empathy, that is, a concern for the hurting and vulnerable that is unmoored from truth, goodness and reality. That's what he's against, right. A few things, a few things there First of all, all things woke, and then setting quote, unquote, woke, and then these categories of just life.

Speaker 1: 11:34

But also it's interesting to slide abuse in there as an ideology that is somehow linked to whatever you think wokeness is, which is no. There's an epidemic of both sexual and spiritual abuse in churches. That's not a it's not kind of the intrusion of some foreign ideological. No, it's just people are now beginning to expose things that have gone on in the dark in churches, right. That has nothing to do with even tossing aside the derogatory mobilization of woke. To throw abuse in there with questions of race and sexuality and things like that indicates, I think, just an intellectual sloppiness in one point.

Speaker 1: 12:39

But the empathy thing, untethered empathy, a concern for the hurting and vulnerable that's unmoored from truth, goodness and reality. Okay, sure that's bad, but the fact of the matter is is that it's.

Speaker 2: 12:55

Why is he connecting it to women? Like that's the thing that I'm like? Wait a second, because the terrible tweet was you know, the faithful men struggle to resist unfaithful women. And I'm going what does this have to do with empathy? Like so okay. So women are more empathetic, and maybe there is a you know scientific study that he cites on this. I don't see that anywhere in this article, or is it just his kind of what he perceives as that? Does that mean men should not be empathetic? It's so interesting. I don't like using that word because it's too neutral.

Speaker 1: 13:38

Okay well, we had this conversation in a past podcast about masculinity and femininity, and part of this is because he and others he and his other compatriots have a certain understanding of masculinity that sees empathy, as described here, as weakness and a number of other kind of elements to it. And, as I said in that other podcast, we are not given anywhere in scripture definitions of masculine or feminine traits. All of those are in many ways cultural accretions. Things that I might call masculine here, in some other cultural context, could be construed as feminine. This is the nature of the way that those particular categories work. But you know, I say that here, but there's a cottage industry of books and resources wanting to tell men and women this is what it means to be a real man. This is what it means to be a real woman.

Speaker 1: 14:55

And to summarize our podcast that we did before, if I wanted to do a sermon on biblical manhood and womanhood, it would be a sermon on the sermon on the mount, because what matters for both manhood and womanhood is Christlikeness, and so that means, yes, a concern for the hurting and the vulnerable that is moored in truth and goodness, and those kinds of things. It seems to me to be a straw man to construct this thing of concern for the hurt and vulnerable that has nothing to do with truth or goodness.

Speaker 2: 15:38

And just by the title of that tweet, but also he's quoting from this article. But it's in a sense it's an attack on feminism or on women, because it's saying that they are the threat and it's almost like a bigger picture of the purity culture conversation of is it men who have to deal with their own issues? Or is it the women who are being accused of being Adjust yourself to my weakness. Don't be empathetic, because I can't take it.

Speaker 1: 16:14

It's a possibility.

Speaker 2: 16:15

Goodness. So there's just a whole lot that I encourage you to read this article and give us your feedback on it. It's pretty rough. I was also just so triggered, slash intrigued by this that I was like I want to know has he spoken on this since this article? And you can go listen to a podcast with Joseph Riggney explaining some more thoughts on this, and it's even more infuriated. Well, it's interesting.

Speaker 1: 16:41

So, as another quote, male groups operate according to male norms, oriented to things or ideas, willing to debate, challenge and provoke one another directly and comfortable with hierarchy. Each of those are very value laden and have nothing to do with being male. But okay, female groups operate according to female norms, oriented to people or feelings, prone to indirect and subtle communication and sublimated conflict, and averse to open disagreement and overt hierarchies, but comfortable with excluding those who violate their social norms. What is this? None of that has anything to do with gender. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 17:27

At all yeah, yeah, he says You're just saying this is the way that male groups operate, this is the way what those things are not connected in any robust way.

Speaker 2: 17:41

The particular groups that you're in? Yes, maybe Right, sure, I know, I know Nor is it like? Commanded to be that way.

Speaker 1: 17:50

I know men who fit all of those categories, women who fit all those categories. There's nothing about being male or female that has anything to do with any of those things.

Speaker 2: 17:57

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 17:58

Being comfortable with hierarchy is a gendered thing. Yeah, that doesn't make any sense. It's just when you actually think these things don't actually make any sense, but when you're.

Speaker 2: 18:12

It's almost like when you're talking to someone and you're like, oh, the I mean the racism is spewing out of you. Do you not hear your? The bigotry is spewing out of you because right after that quote of a faithful man's struggle to resist unfaithful women, he says she wolves, especially ones who present themselves as victims, give even faithful men fits because of the unavoidable asymmetries in the dynamics, and I'm just like you just used she wolves.

Speaker 1: 18:41

Yeah, oh, I.

Speaker 2: 18:44

Goodness.

Speaker 1: 18:45

It's just, it's Anyway, anyway.

Speaker 2: 18:50

Let's get some positive content. Slim Positive content. Well, we're in the terrible tweet section. Let's get out of the terrible tweet section for punk. You had a tweet you wanted to talk about, right?

Speaker 1: 19:04

No, I didn't Okay.

Speaker 2: 19:05

Okay.

Speaker 1: 19:05

Oh my gosh. One of the first rules of improv is supposed to be you never respond with no, it said. You respond with yes and. But I broke that rule, it's fine.

Speaker 2: 19:24

Can we do improv, malcolm? Huh, you want to do an improv?

Speaker 1: 19:27

This whole, I consider this whole podcast to essentially be improv. Oh yeah, okay, it's not scripted, true, true.

Speaker 2: 19:33

I just meant like do you want to?

Speaker 1: 19:36

I did improv in college for a little bit. Hey be funny Go. Yeah, not smart Smell, this works.

Speaker 2: 19:45

Well, I've continued to be surprised that anyone listens to our podcast, and even today, after 20 minutes in goodness, we got to get on it that you might still be listening, but we're thankful that you are listening, that you are reviewing it and some of y'all are writing in, and so today I wanted to respond to an email that came in and then also go into our conversation on nonviolence. But this is an email from one of our listeners, alan, who says I want to comment on your most recent podcast discussion. I think it was a couple of weeks ago.

Speaker 2: 20:17

The person who wrote in to ask about the relationship between being reformed and being biblically saved. What do you think he meant by biblically saved? Did he mean substitutionary atonement? Did y'all still find the atonement theory to be faithful to the witness of the New Testament and or find it fruitful for discipleship? Let's pause there. Do we think the relationship between being reformed and being biblically saved? What do we mean? What do we think he meant by biblically saved? I can't speak for him. What did he mean by biblically saved? I'll.

Speaker 1: 20:56

It's an interesting phrase in of itself.

Speaker 2: 20:58

Yeah, I'll pause it. I don't think he meant by the atonement theory, but I'll throw out that I think he meant that you Romans 10, 9, confess with your mouth that Jesus, lord, believe your heart, that God raised him from the dead, then you will be saved. Lord and Savior is my best guess at what he meant by being biblically saved. I think that's all we can say because we don't really know what he meant. I'm not going to have a monologue into that. I wanted to read this on our air so that we could then respond to the second question here. Did he mean substitute, sharing atonement? And do y'all still find that atonement theory to be faithful to the witness of the Testament? And so, if you haven't yet, dear listener, but also others, we encourage you to go back to episode 21, where we do our atonement theories with Dr Jacob Randolph, friend of ours, and we went through a couple of the different theories out there and I wanted to quickly do a drive-by of those real quick and then talk about substitutionary atonement.

Speaker 1: 22:15

So so he probably meant specifically penal substitutionary atonement.

Speaker 2: 22:24

Yes, yeah, but the overarching 30,000-foot view, some of the other theories. So the question of the atonement is asking the question of what actually happened on the cross. What did Jesus accomplish, what was that for? And one is the moral influence theory that Jesus came and died in order to bring about kind of a positive change to humanity. Do you see what his sacrificial love and that encourages you to do likewise? And so I think that's one. Another is kind of the ransom theory. Adi, eve sold humanity over to the devil at the time of the fall, hence justice required that God pay the devil a ransom, for the devil did not realize that Christ could not be held in the bonds of death. And so it's this ransom theory. Well, some people have a problem with that because they're like is the devil really holding anyone ransom? Does he have that power?

Speaker 2: 23:30

The next one is one I think I've moved. I think, malcolm, you've moved more into and leaned more heavily into the Christus Victor and I think kind of widely considered to be the dominant theory for most of the historical Christian church. And Jesus dies in order to defeat the powers of evil, such as sin, death and the devil, in order to free mankind from their bondage, and so I think that's probably the most convincing one. Now, in the Middle Ages, anselm famously brought forth the satisfaction theory. And to satisfy the justice of God, and this is where we then it moves into the penal substitutionary toment theory as the next one, and this one was made prominent by the reformers you can think Calvin Luthor and they took a little bit of Anselm's theory and modified it slightly and added a more legal or forensic framework into that notion of the cross as satisfaction, satisfying the wrath of God.

Speaker 2: 24:32

Jesus Christ dies to satisfy his God wrath against humans' sin, and so Jesus is punished, penal in the place of sinners. That's the substitution, in order to satisfy the justice of God and the legal demand of God to punish sin. People might point to 1 Peter, 2, 24, says he himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that he might die to sin and to live to righteousness. You can think of Isaiah 53 by his wounds or stripes you have been healed. And so this is the prominent theory, atonement theory that I think most people I've come in contact with and in churches, that people assume is the one reason, the one implication of the cross, and I think it's there right, this.

Speaker 1: 25:27

Mostly because we're in broadly reformed and evangelical circles.

Speaker 2: 25:30

Yeah, yeah. So that's another good point and I think the overarching point that I believe that is I've had to kind of slowly realize is how much we are all influenced by our culture that we live in currently or even in our own circles, own particular branches of the church, as well as where the reformers were coming from.

Speaker 2: 25:55

And so this is something that I think was really interesting, as I was looking back at kind of penal substitutionary atonement and kind of reconsidering this ago and like is this, as the listener asked, a satisfying? How did he ask the question? Do I find it a faithful witness to the New Testament and find it fruitful for discipleship? And so I've been trying to think about it, and one of the things I think is helpful is realizing that the reformers were Luke. Luther was fueled by his angry rejection of the corrupt practice of indulgences and also of the rejection of mass, of recrucifying Jesus over and over again. And so I think the reformers were responding to a problem in their day, and I think that's helpful for us to think about this.

Speaker 2: 26:54

A new angle on the cross in that time was saying like no, no, no, you can't buy people out of purgatory, because what Jesus did is he paid it all. And so it's a kind view of seeing it that way Jesus not being recrucified over and over and over again, because what he's done is once in for all. And so I think it's a kind view of seeing it this way, and I can hear people saying today though yeah, but the Bible substitution or atonement sounds like cosmic child abuse. It sounds like God is just so angry. This is like sinners in the hands of an angry God type sermon that he's just this wrathful God that just needs to be appeased. And if that's how God sees us, it feels like Like if I was told my dad is furious with me and not just furious with me, hates me. But my mom says no, it's cool, I've made it okay, I'm not walking into my home, going. Yeah, things are great, I can't wait to give my dad a big old hug.

Speaker 2: 28:06

There is probably if what feels like a gap there, which is where I think a lot of people are feel like the penal substitution or atonement theory leads us to be there, and so I just feel like the Reformers were giving biblical answers. And this is actually this is a quote from NT Wright about this. He says the Reformers were trying to give biblical answers to medieval questions how can an angry God be pacified, both here in mass and afterwards in purgatory? To both questions they replied no, god's wrath was already pacified through the death of Jesus, but they did not challenge the underlying idea that the gospel was all about pacifying divine wrath. And he says the Reformers failed to challenge the larger heaven and hell framework. Some of this is coming if you want to look more of this. This is coming from this book NT Wright wrote called the Day the Revolution Began, and I think it's a really helpful book. So I think that's background story to all of this. How do you respond to this, malcolm? Thank, you.

Speaker 1: 29:07

I think that Penal Substitutionary Atonement gives one aspect of the kaleidoscope of what Jesus does on the cross.

Speaker 1: 29:21

Because, Jesus does a lot of things on the cross. When we I was talking to a friend of mine just about the kind of the trajectories in Christian history, especially the distinction between the Western and Eastern trajectories, the Western Church, particularly because of Augustine, augustine, sets up a number of questions that then, for Western Christians, western Christians think that these are the most important theological questions to ask and answer. And thus goes the history of Western Church history. My favorite theologians are some of the Greek Church fathers who are in some ways uninterested with some of the questions that keep a lot of Europeans awake. And it's important to remember that, especially if we're talking about something like the cross. There is no.

Speaker 1: 30:28

The Bible has a lot to say about what Jesus did on the cross. He defeated the power of the principalities. He stood in our place. There's a lot of things that he did. If there's any point at which we take one of those things and say this is the gospel, then we're actually closing ourselves off from the richness and the fullness of what Christ has done for us.

Speaker 1: 31:00

So I was talking to Slim with reference to a recent sermon where I think when I was first preaching, I thought every single one of my sermons has to refer to the cross in this specific way, and that is that's a weaker way to preach, really, because not every piece of Scripture is about Jesus dying in my place and taking the wrath of God on my path. Every text is not about that, and that's not the only thing that goes on at the cross, and it's one of my goals that, at least for our congregation, that they understand the richness of who Christ is, and not only what he's done for us, but the ways in which that has reshaped the cosmos and thus ought to reshape the way that we interact with the cosmos. So it's helpful in its place, similar to any other theory of the atonement. If it teaches me about who God is and what God has done for me in a way that leads me to deeper worship and deeper love of him and love of my neighbor, then that's good.

Speaker 2: 32:45

Yeah, and I think your point of only preaching one way of this and feeling as if every sermon had to preach penile substitutionary atonement, as you said, hindered or hampered are preaching.

Speaker 2: 33:01

And also, I think when listening to sermons, I think I arrogantly listened and when someone didn't do that, I was like they don't know, they're not preaching the gospel, they're not preaching the gospel and I just arrogantly ignored the rest of the sermon and going, and it's been a struggle to de-brainwash myself from some of these things, because it was constantly there, because it was like this is the only way to see it, and so I think what the word you used earlier of kaleidoscope I think Jake talked about that and that episode I still think it's such a helpful way of seeing all that Jesus did on the cross Is this kaleidoscope? Or he may have even talked about it as like the black hole of just like sucking all these things in there. You're not really sure what happens at the cross, but it's all of these things, and I think, as we concluded on that episode, if you only emphasize one at the expense of the others, then we're missing out, and so, at the same time, I don't want to say there's something wrong with penile substitutionary torment, because Jesus did accomplish something on the cross. It wasn't just this moving story of what this sacrificial love, though, was, that, like First John 4 says, this is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another, and so I feel like even in those two verses it encapsulates a lot of those theories right there.

Speaker 2: 34:34

But I I just think what we want to do is see it all and try to preach it all in a very balanced way if possible. So I hope that answers the question, if not right in Hello at theologypiecescom. But such a good question, such a good question and we might have to revisit it because I do think, as I just said, sometimes it's going to take a while for me to de-brainwash, unbrainwash. D program, d program. He also says book recommendation of the year Richard Hayes, the moral vision of the New Testament.

Speaker 2: 35:09

It's great book that's one of your favorites right it is. It's a great book.

Speaker 1: 35:13

I have not read it.

Speaker 2: 35:14

I love it Awesome.

Speaker 1: 35:16

It's good. It deals with all the all the controversial issues. Oh that's great. Well, we don't like to talk about anything controversial here. Yeah, of course not.

Speaker 2: 35:27

Speaking of Christians should not serve in the military.

Speaker 1: 35:31

Let's talk, let's talk, let's talk.

Speaker 2: 35:37

All right, so this conversation.

Speaker 1: 35:39

That's a bold claim, Slim.

Speaker 2: 35:41

Let's talk about it. And while I'm plugging in my laptop because I'm realizing my computer's about, to die?

Speaker 1: 35:51

Yeah, that would not be good, super professional.

Speaker 2: 35:58

So we're talking about nonviolence and the reason we're talking about it is because a few weeks ago I preached a sermon titled nonviolent resistance and it's a call for Christians, and we were walking through the Beatitudes in our Sermon on the Mount series at our church here in Waco, texas If you're not from Waco, it's delightful, it is 67 degrees in February, it's beautiful. But preach one of the verses there Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God. And kind of a summary of that sermon that we can link here is that if God is calling us to be peacemakers, at the very least that means we can't be war makers. And if that's the case, then we have a lot to reconsider. And you could say another way later in the Sermon on the Mount, when Jesus says love your enemies, he probably means don't kill them, probably.

Speaker 1: 36:58

Just drop that down there at the base level.

Speaker 2: 37:03

It's pretty safe to say, and one of the things that I cited as well as kind of like thinking through this a little more, is when Jesus is getting arrested and his good friend Peter tries to save him and step in front, he cuts off the guard's ear. And I assume this is me reading the text. Yes, speaking of Isegesis, I assume Peter is not aiming for his ear. I assume he's aiming for the guard's jugular, but the guard probably shifted and he only cut off his ear. Either way, the first thing Jesus says in that moment is don't do that. And then he heals the guard. And so in this moment, when he tells Peter to put his sword away, tertullian says in this moment, what's his quote there? He says he-.

Speaker 1: 37:58

In disarming Peter, he disarmed all of us.

Speaker 2: 38:00

Yes, in disarming Peter, he disarmed all of us, and this is one of those things that I think we have to then talk about is what does that mean? What does it mean that we are called to non-violence? Can Christians serve in the military? Can Christians-.

Speaker 1: 38:21

So those are-.

Speaker 2: 38:23

Quite a just war.

Speaker 1: 38:24

Yeah, so those are two slightly different questions. Because you can, hypothetically you could serve in the military in a non-combat role. Okay, Technically that's like, technically that is a thing in existence and so Like chaplain. Like chaplain.

Speaker 1: 38:45

Like medic, like those things. Those things are possible, but if you're asking specifically about being a soldier, those things don't match, and that's been and we've talked about this a little bit but especially in the first few centuries of the church, this was one of these things that actually much of the early church community was not actually fighting about. And this is at a time when Roman conscription was mandatory, and it's one of the things that leads to this kind of sporadic persecution, because you have this group of people who are like we're not going to fight your wars because that's not the way that Christ has called us to live with one another, yeah and so yeah, I mean that's- and it seems radical, I think.

Speaker 2: 39:59

Because of what? Because well, here let's start how radical Like it means we can't support war we shouldn't participate in war, we shouldn't pay for war, we shouldn't wage war. We are banned from this, and if these are things that we are saying, we cannot do. A Christian cannot do these things. Well, we live in a very war, a pro-war country.

Speaker 1: 40:27

Yeah, yeah, it's a warmongering country. We can say that. So there are a few things here because it's complicated, because a lot of our so you have some communities, especially some Mennonite communities, that take there's a I'm not sure exactly precisely what process it is, but because of their Because of their opposition to war, it's also an opposition to paying particular taxes. Just because our taxes go to I mean, they fund the war effort. Yeah, that's one way of approaching that. I think that you know, I think when Jesus tells his disciples to pay their taxes, he's done to pay their taxes to a Roman Empire, which is also a warmongering empire. I don't want people to feel guilty for what I mean really, for what the states are going to do, things that are contrary to the logic of the kingdom of God. That doesn't keep.

Speaker 1: 41:42

Jesus from telling people to pay their taxes.

Speaker 2: 41:45

This is why Daniel and Revelation refer to the state as a beast.

Speaker 1: 41:50

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whenever you get apocalyptic beasts in the scriptures, they are almost always with reference to states. Yeah, yeah, so that's-. Yeah, so-. I'm just gonna add this pay for war thing, because we shouldn't, obviously, if you're but I would in some ways bracket taxes from that conversation. Sure but if you're talking about defense contractors and all this stuff, it's like yeah, no, you're clear of this.

Speaker 2: 42:32

Yeah, and I think this is where I think Just think about this If this is something that you're already going, I don't know but what about this war, this war, this war like a just war, and this is something for the first 300 years of Christianity, people wouldn't serve in the military, and it wasn't until Christianity got in bed with Constantine that it was kind of a okay, maybe we can justify this.

Speaker 2: 42:58

And then I mean, I took me to do a deep dive in this. You just think, like this is like this is what the church always has been fine with Nah. And it wasn't until Guston was made an argument which I think he does some good things and bad things an argument for a just war theory. That even then you go okay, what justifies war, a just war? And I would say, if anyone had a reason to have a just war, it would have been Jesus against the principalities, shooting at him right then. And you know, you could say, well, he did win that war, but it was in a different way, but he wouldn't have rebuked Peter for what he did, because that would have been a just war in that sense. But I think-.

Speaker 1: 43:43

It's important for us to. When we look at the actual wars that we've engaged in, I think especially I mean you think from most of human history you won't find a war that is actually operated justly in all these kinds of things, because once you introduce the things that war includes, you can set all the guidelines you want. But while wars are easy to start, they're very difficult to stop. This is one of the things that, as the conflict with Israel and Hamas was started, get off the ground and stuff like that. These kinds of things, once they're sparked, the logic of revenge and retaliation and all that kind of stuff, it fuels all of these things. And so we can talk as much as we want about just war theory and stuff like that, but in many ways, when you actually look at the wars that have actually been waged, none of them have been waged justly.

Speaker 2: 45:09

And this is where I didn't put this in the sermon you leave a lot on the cutting floor. But one of the things that I'm researching for this was realizing that if you were to look at the deaths in wars by centuries and just seeing from 16th, 17th, 18th, 20th century, it goes from 1.6 million to 6.1 million, to 7 to 19, and then in the 20th century, 105 million deaths. And it said and the majority of those who've died were not combatants.

Speaker 1: 45:36

Yeah, they're not combatants.

Speaker 2: 45:38

Studies have found that since 1700, civilian deaths averaged 50% of all deaths in all wars, 50%, and so that means we can anticipate in any modern war that we have at least half of the people killed are non-combatants, and you can talk about Israel, Hamas and this is like you would say. Probably that would be north of that, and so and I actually was kind of nervous you're nervous when you preach sermons like this that tend to touch on, I think, things that people in our culture are committed to, and I had someone come up to me and said you know, I served in the military and I was like okay, yes, what did you think?

Speaker 2: 46:22

Just waiting to get obliterated? And they were like and I absolutely agree with everything you just said because I saw how we tried to justify our war and we just did some horrendous ugly things and I've heard this from other people as well as some of the most the biggest advocates for non-violence are former military police officers, military officers who've seen how unjust our wars have been. And just the United States alone, we spent $877 billion on our military, which is just absurd. It's you know, it's ridiculous.

Speaker 1: 47:00

And the Pentagon feels its audits when we ask them where that money actually goes.

Speaker 2: 47:11

And so this is the reality we're living in right now, and so we're. We're living in a very militarized country, and my suggestion to our listeners, if you're hesitant about this conversation, I would just say is it possible that we are being influenced by our culture? Some of those millions of dollars I looked into that, where some of it went some of those millions of dollars went into advertising in NFL games and in NASCAR, to show that, no, we're all on board, we're all supportive of the military.

Speaker 1: 47:48

Yeah. So I would phrase it not so much that we are a militarized country, but that there is an idolatry of the military. We'll say it that way Sure that there is a and already I'm stepping on toes, that's fine.

Speaker 2: 48:12

This is our podcast.

Speaker 1: 48:13

here's what we want Um but, but, but, but, there, but. But specifically for the Christian, that was slim listening to himself on the, on the, on the on the, on, the, on, the, on the on the.

Speaker 2: 48:30

I pull up a quote.

Speaker 1: 48:31

I pull up a quote Well, I mean, like I, just I, I, I desperately want every Christian, whenever we're thinking about any ethical and political ethical or political issue, to run through the lens of what Christ likeness looks like in this space. Yeah, and there is and there is, and there just isn't a way to link up killing anybody with Christ likeness, regardless of what that person has done, regardless of what that person has done to you or to your country or or whatever. Yeah, because that, that, that framing, I could like that. Like that, when, when, when Jesus, when Jesus tells us to love, to love our enemies, like he's not just saying, well, just like, just love those people who are, who are mean to you, but but political enemies and stuff like that, no, like it's fine to, it's fine to wage war against them or whatever. No, he doesn't say that.

Speaker 1: 49:27

Yeah, um, and, and, and we have to be relentless about, about, about, about, about applying the commands of Christ to every, to every single element of our lives.

Speaker 2: 49:37

Yeah, and one of the one of the, the, the I think universal responses to this type of ethic is the response I got on social media the what abouts, the what abouts. And so I want to hit the what abouts and then I want to go to scripture Cause I, I, I want to be quick through the what abouts Cause. The scripture part, I think, is where I've spent the last couple of weeks going. Yeah, you're, these are inch, you know, difficult things to think about, but the, the practical what abouts, and this is one that we got on one of our um, uh, in a response to the sermon um on social media. It said clear this up for me If an attacker is raping your wife and I just pause to say like this is publicly, this is the first image you've. You've now put out there, um, and you walk in, you're saying it's a sin or being a non-peacemaker, if you want to call it that to physically or violently make them stop. I don't think rapists respond to polite, please stop, request, but correct me if I'm wrong.

Speaker 1: 50:42

And Once again, this is a this is a conflation. I mean, first of all, it's, it's, it's it's gross to to do that Just as a as a as a response to that sermon, to then to go to that, to go to that point, that's. There's other issues there, yeah, but the other thing is that there is a conflation of, um, non-violence or anti-violence, with passivity, yes, um.

Speaker 2: 51:12

Cause there's a huge gap between being non-violent and being violent, Like there's a there's a big gap there. Yeah, and it doesn't mean you do nothing and you go. Please stop.

Speaker 1: 51:22

Resistance to injustice. Resistance to injustice takes a number of different forms.

Speaker 2: 51:27

I would actively tackle right Like.

Speaker 1: 51:29

What we're, what we're saying is I don't ever need to kill anybody. Yeah, and, and, and, and. There's a but. But. But, but, specifically, there's something about. There's something about this issue that just that shuts people down Like it shuts people down when, when, and, and, and and. Ethical imagination goes out the window. You create these, you create these circumstances in your mind where you think well, the only response, the only response that makes sense to me, is to kill this person. I, I, I started out this with, with, um, um, my lynching research.

Speaker 1: 52:09

Francis Francis Grimke is, is, is, is one of the pastors that I spend a fair amount of time with, and he and, and in 1899, when he's responding to the, to the lynching of Sam, of Sam Hose, he's, he's, he's, he's out of persuasion that, hey, like, if we just if, if we just educate people as to why this is, why this is happening, the kinds of racial prejudice that people are subject to, and stuff like that, then this kind of violence will stop. And and, over the course of the next few years, like, the violence just kind of picks up. And so, after the Atlanta race ride in 1906, he, he, he, he, he essentially says uh, look, the only way to stop a mob is to shoot it to death or dynamite it, and, and and what I and, and I see that, and this is what I say, this is what I say in the books you're getting a little bit of a sneak, sneak, sneak preview. That is a failure of ethical imagination, because it, because it's a, because it's a failure to see even those, even the lynch mob. It's a failure to see even the lynch mob as a group of human beings.

Speaker 1: 53:09

Once they become, once they become a faceless mob that you can just dynamite and be done with, you've lost, you've in some ways lost the. You've in some ways lost the lost. The plot Doesn't make what they're doing any less, any less, any less evil, any less, any less egregious. But at the but, at the point that you get to where you, where you're like, the only way for me to stop this person is to kill them. You've, you, you've failed to apply particularly a, particularly a, a, a spirit filled imagination to your situation. And if you wait, if you wait until you get into that crisis situation before you even think about those alternatives, then you've done, then you've, then you've also done yourself a disservice.

Speaker 1: 53:53

And the fact of the matter is is that is that is that most of us are not willing to go through the effort of thinking through okay, like what, what? What actually are my deepest? What actually are my deepest commitments Is what crisis commanded me to do and the way he's commanded me to live and treat everyone around me. Is that actually my deepest commitments? Is that actually my deepest commitment, or are there other things that are more important to me than that?

Speaker 2: 54:16

And the fact that it reveals it yeah.

Speaker 1: 54:18

And this is, and this is why, when, this is why, when, when, when, when, when Martin Luther King gathered people to do, to do the protest that they, that they did, people were trained because you, you do not naturally, if somebody comes at you with dogs, fire hoses or whatever, your first response is not to respond non-violently. And so that's why everybody who I, everybody who went through those marches were trained to be able to respond, because they're like, you're going to face violence. This is, this is what, this is the way that you're tempted, this is the way you're going to be tempted to respond. But here are other, here are other ways, and so so one of the things that just bothers me is that people think that there are an alternative. It's like, no, you haven't looked for them.

Speaker 2: 54:58

Yeah, I saw him be interviewed and the guy was like so, like, so, you're saying if this happened you wouldn't do anything? And his response was like people confuse non-violence or pacifism, I think he went with as weakness and he's like there's nothing weak about this the fact that you train to not respond in violence in this way.

Speaker 1: 55:22

That requires more strength than just than just reactively punching somebody back in the face.

Speaker 1: 55:26

It's like. It's like a reflex. There was, I've been in, I have been, I, I I've been in one fight in my life. Oh, it was back in fourth grade. Yeah, dude, there was a guy, did you win? So there was a guy that I, there was a guy that I provoked on the, just on the. We were just playing outside, but I was, but I was, but I was provoking him, and and he and he grabbed me and he slammed me face first into a brick wall and and there was, and like I didn't think, I whipped around and punched him in the face and that, but and then, and then the teacher pulled us, pulled us apart, but there it was. It was a reflex, it was just a visceral reflex. It was just like I gotta do something. And that's what I, and that's what and and and and.

Speaker 1: 56:15

And I contrast that with me, the same person when, like, my little brother provoked me, like for just for years, just, you know, brother, brother, stuff, but I refused, I refused to hit him back.

Speaker 1: 56:31

And so my, my dad told me it's like, malcolm, you, if you want to hit him, you can, you can hit him Like you're not going to get in trouble, you're not going to get in trouble, but I never, but I never, but I never did, and and and I and I told, and, and basically I told, I told my dad like this was as a, as a young kid, I was like, no, but like, but retaliation is wrong.

Speaker 1: 56:55

And and at that point my like, I mean my dad will, my dad will tell me he's like you. Basically I, I was telling him about non, about non-violence that's awesome, but, but, but, but I, but I pair those two things, because when you're, when you're in a situation like you can get in situations where, where, where, where reflexes kick in, and if your reflexes haven't been trained, then your, then then your reflex is going to say this person came after me, I'm going to put them in the ground. And unless we do, unless we do the hard work of retraining, of kind of retraining ourselves, then that's the way we're going to hear a sermon like yours and respond with a Facebook post like that yeah, um, but it's because, it's because many of our ethical imaginations have not, have just have not been there's, there's still some sanctification to do.

Speaker 2: 57:48

And I and I and I get people who are coming at this from a. They would argue that they are being pro-life by saying that they will, they will shoot their, these attackers cause they're trying to save their family, and so they come up with this, this fictional scenario where someone comes in and tries to kill their family and they're trying to protect their family, and I would say, as the research bears out, that that more of these uh, uh gun deaths happen from something that happened internally. Um, it's going to happen with a self-inflicted wounds or a child finding the, the. The key to the gun cabinet and things like this, where you go, is that gun actually providing the safety you want, and so, and if someone does break into our home, they can steal our stuff. We've had people, we've had someone break into our home.

Speaker 2: 58:36

Yeah, it's happened and and we've chose not to, you know, press charges Like it's it who cares, it's stuff, um, but like, so if someone comes after our, our family again, what can I do except for try to lay? I'll put my, my life down the line for them, but I'm not going to murder this. Whoever it might be to do this Cause, then it reveals my you know what, what I actually believe about what? Do I think they're the other the enemy, or do I love the enemy? And it it would, yes, who I? This is what I'm trying to prepare myself. If that, if something as horrendous that has ever, ever does happen, who knows what will happen in the moment if the, the something takes over?

Speaker 1: 59:18

Who knows what any of us would do in those moments.

Speaker 2: 59:19

But I do think this is the ethic that Jesus is calling us to, and so that's where it's like okay, here's the practical, but let's, let's get to where what Jesus is calling us to. But before that I forgot, we had another email come in from a Jaja asking about like but what about? Compulsory military service.

Speaker 2: 59:35

Cause we're in a country where you're not required to serve, what if you're in a country that requires you to serve? What do you do then? And I think that I think similarly, if you're required, you, you, you have, you have to go. Or is there a civil disobedience, a nonviolent resistance that you can take, even in that country?

Speaker 1: 59:53

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 59:54

I think I don't know the. I've not sure if I fleshed this all out in my own thinking, but I would say there is a way to serve in any, any organization that is not glorifying God, whether it be the beastly military or it be a greedy corporation. There's a way to serve in it. And to you know, work to its, its, its beauty, try to bring out the be the salt of the the earth, even in in those organizations as well. As there's a way to be a salt in the preservative sense of fighting against the natural tendencies towards the ugliness that it could go. And so is there a way to serve in the military and try to value life. I would say find that way. And if that just means that you take a personal commitment that I will not, I will not murder, I will not kill, I would make that known to your, to the people around you, though.

Speaker 1: 1:00:48

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:00:52

And so then, if, if they, if they end up forcing you to kill, that's when I think you go like well, I, I have a, I have a ultimate authority that I have to listen to.

Speaker 1: 1:01:02

This is interesting, slim, because this may be a point of this, may have become a point of disagreement between the two of us when it comes to our political theologies, in the sense that, like you know, I think that I think that there might be some. I think that there are some places that Christians can't be, and I think there are some especially. I think I've mentioned this before. You'd asked me five years ago. I would have responded it's like no, like Christians should be everywhere, being salt and light everywhere and all this kind of stuff.

Speaker 2: 1:01:40

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 1:01:42

But I. But now, as I think about it more, I'm like well, but actually there are, there are some places that, by virtue of you being in that place and doing a particular job, you're not even just tacit support. You are not even not even just tacit support like you're. You may be actively, you may be actively support, like actively supporting evil, in which case you, in which case your witness is not your, your witness is not you being like, you being there, but distinct. Your witness is actually you being separate and you saying I'm going to refuse to take part in this. It's an incredibly risky, it's an incredibly risky move. But but I think sometimes and and and, once again, I mean I think this is one of the things that I mean, it's one of the things that got folks, one of the things that got folks martyred in the early church. But it was and and and. That's foreign. It's foreign to many of our experiences, because we're used to, I mean, we're used to a state that's kind of broadly sympathetic to us.

Speaker 2: 1:02:53

Yeah, I guess, I guess the another way of phrasing this is trying to put this outside of our state. So you know, we, we, I know Jhajha was asking kind of more on Taiwan and China, but let's say, let's go back. And you know, I don't know why I keep going back to this with this exact example these last couple of weeks with Hitler.

Speaker 2: 1:03:14

But let's say you are a 17 year old who's being recruited to enlist in German's military, is it honorable and right for you to serve your country and is it the right thing to do as a Christian? And I think that's where you're like, that's where you say nope, can't do that, I can't be a part of that, and so that's where I just think it's one of the things that I think we have to rethink, and so even even I appreciate you pushing back and going. There might be ways and so like. Also, if you're going to work for a weapons maker like you shouldn't be a part of that as a Christian, and I think cause like I think we feel like the only way that things change is if Christians are in those spaces, and this is not.

Speaker 1: 1:04:03

this is not true.

Speaker 2: 1:04:05

You could make change by leaving those spaces.

Speaker 1: 1:04:08

Also like, also like, it's not well and like, but also it's like not on, it's not on you to redeem the world too. So, like the Lord, I mean the Lord can, I mean the Lord will put you. Like the Lord will put you in spots. Like the Lord will put you in spots. But I think part of the political theology that tells you Christians should be everywhere is also telling you, like Christians are how the world is redeemed. Basically, and I'm I just I don't think that anymore.

Speaker 1: 1:04:44

I think that I think that the world, I think that the world is, I think that the world is changed by seeing what a community of people who live by, who live according to the kingdom of God, like that. Like people are changed by seeing that and I think that, like, that's essentially been the plan essentially from the beginning. It's why God, it's why God called the people to himself for the good of the, for the good of the nations. I think that's and so and so, like, my, my deeper assumptions about how social change happens has shifted. It's not so much about just Christians being everywhere. It's about, it's about the, it's about it's about it's about Christian communities actually being Christian communities. And so when, so so, when you make a risky decision like that. You're not left out in the cold. You actually have a community that's gonna back you, that's gonna back you up when you make that kind of decision.

Speaker 2: 1:05:47

So, yeah, no, I was gonna say so. I think I'm all in on this. I preached the sermon on it because I felt like that's what the text was was communicating, and I didn't think we needed to go into all the what abouts, because that's not where the text went. It was just bless her the peacemakers and I think later, you know, love your enemies. All of that to say now a response, not not just in the practical of what he do when this happens, but now the response that I I think is a very good question is Well, that sounds like what Jesus is saying. Yes, he does seem to be arguing, for that Doesn't seem like what the Old Testament saying, though, does feel like there's a big chasm between the Old Testament God and the New Testament God, and I don't, I Don't want to say that there's not a point there. So there, if, if, the if, jesus, god himself the word of the word God made flesh is is arguing and advocating for peacemaking and loving our enemies, and yet, throughout the Old Testament, we see the Lord Fighting and destroying enemies.

Speaker 2: 1:07:05

There seems to be a gap, and so you could, you, you could point to, I mean, the one of the biggest is the know and the flood, and when I was, you know, growing up in sunny school, it was the happiest story in the world. You got Jurassic and elephants and everyone making this flood and making this this Ark. But as you get older, you realize, wait, this is, this is Dark, this is a lot of people dying, except for a few people and the animals here, and so there's just this massive flood. And whether you believe it's a worldwide flood or a localized flood, either way, the, the emphasis is clear that a lot of people die based off of this. Or you could look into the, the Red Sea, and now you know analogy no Red Sea story.

Speaker 2: 1:07:51

When, when Moses is leading the people out out from from Egypt and yes, egypt is the big, bad oppressor and yet when they leave and they go through the Red Sea, the Lord brings the sea back and crushes the Egyptians. And Moses sings this, the song in Exodus 15 3 the Lord is a warrior, the Lord is his name. Pharoah's chariots in his army he has hurled into the sea. The best of Pharoah's officers are drowned in the Red Sea. Or you could think about Elijah calling down fire on the people, or you could think of the Canaanite extermination first. Samuel 15 3 says now go Attack the Amalakites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them. Put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep.

Speaker 1: 1:08:43

Donkeys. So what are you suggesting? Slim.

Speaker 2: 1:08:44

So One response is Marcian. And Marcian was this heretic? They've been declared that and and he, he really pit the Old Testament versus the New Testament so strongly that he would go through the New Testament and cut out versus mm-hmm that were that he thought were offense that he thought Basically, that he thought were offensive and not right, not descriptions of the of the father of Jesus.

Speaker 2: 1:09:12

Yeah, and so then there's that so there's that, there's that way of seeing that there's such a gap between the Old Testament and New Testament. New testaments are completely new God and that's the one we want to follow. Old Testament cut it out. But the problem with that is, as Jesus says, you know, he is fulfilling the Old Testament law. He is, he is the fulfillment of it. He is not, he's not Getting rid of it. I mean, we're in the Sermon the Mallory says you know that he's not a jot or tittle is going to be Washed away from this. He's, he's, he's fulfilling it all. So then there's there's. There's some other responses to this and there's one.

Speaker 2: 1:09:50

One response to this is that there is the real God of who God actually is versus the depicted God, and saying that the Old Testament is a, it's a divine accommodation route, and this is popular by Pete ends, greg Boyd brines on, and I was telling Malcolm this question last week.

Speaker 2: 1:10:10

Are you gonna time? We're going a little long, but Last week I asked this is. This is from Brian's on in his book Sinners and Hands of a Loving God, which is a fun title, and he he says if God told you to kill babies, would you? And which is a great question for anyone to be asked, dear listener, if God told you to kill babies, would you? And his three responses that he says you, you, you can have in this sense is to decide first, either the first one is when God Commands you to kill, it's not immoral because God commanded it. And so if God commanded, it's not immoral, and, as he responds here, like well, this is what justified the killing of Native Americans and all of the ugliness and and kind of Christian history. In the same say, like well, in the name of God.

Speaker 1: 1:11:10

That is the claim. It didn't like. God see, because here's, here's, at least, at least in those, at least in those cases, I could say this pretty, pretty confidently that God did not tell them to do that Right, but it was politically advantageous for them to do it right.

Speaker 2: 1:11:27

So okay, 100% agree. But you could claim that so is it. The first one is what God commands you to kill.

Speaker 1: 1:11:34

It's not immoral divine justification is a Great justification. Go ahead, god told me to.

Speaker 2: 1:11:39

Second, god is in the process of change, so maybe God changed, maybe he changed who he was. From the Old Testament to the New Testament, it was something God used to do and used to command, but he doesn't now. And so first is a question of Immorality of God, but now it's the question of the immutability of God and whether God changes or not. And the idea of abandoning the immutability of God feels like we're now building our house on Shifting sand and you're not sure you know when or if God is gonna change, and so that's One that he would argue against. And so then his third response is or we have to decide, we have to change how we read scripture. Does every verse reveal God perfectly or is it a document? There's just document, the journey that Israel is on on the continuing revelation of God.

Speaker 2: 1:12:35

And so he actually challenges that third one and and that we need to reinterpret everything, assuming that we've read the scriptures wrong, and and not just that we've read it wrong, that the authors are mistaken, that God didn't command these things, but they did him, and then they attributed those commands to God. So here's where, at first, I was like he makes a really good, really strong case in this and in terms of. You know, I definitely want to believe in the immutability of God. I'm a big fan of the continuation of the Old Testament, new Testament. I'm a big fan of those things. I'm a big fan against, you know, god's immorality.

Speaker 1: 1:13:14

I so God's what you said immorality.

Speaker 2: 1:13:18

I'm a good yeah, I did say that I'm a big fan in God's morality. Okay, and not going against that and assuming he's he's wrong in these things. So then I'm following, you know his argument. Here I'm going like I guess you got to go with three. But here's the problem. Like it's hard to see Some of these things, like if the flood narrative, if, if it's a worldwide flood, it still happened, what?

Speaker 2: 1:13:49

Like are you trying to say that people reinterpret and say, well, maybe it's just natural, it was just the natural, you know, it's just the weather. But doesn't God have the power to hold back the, the rain in this way? But I think the bigger question, I think, is he, I'm, I'm, let me praise it, I'm, I praise him and them for trying to interpret all things in light of Christ. But I think it pits Christ against the rest of scripture and creates a canon within a canon, meaning they're trying to say like Jesus is against the this way of doing things. But Jesus never disowns the Old Testament.

Speaker 2: 1:14:28

He's trying to say these writers got it wrong and if that was the case, you would think Jesus would have been like correcting them in Sermon on the mountain, things like this of saying like, yeah, that wasn't exactly right. And if that's true, then how do you know if, as you read the Old Testament, if you're ever reading the troop depiction of God, or the fake one, and so it? It's just very difficult, and their answer there would be like well, the question is, though does it match what we know about Jesus? And then I think that puts you in the position of the One who has to decide those things, and so I mean I applaud that approach and I kind of want to go there with them Because I really want to figure this out. I think Pete ends says this, that you know it's hard to appeal to God of the Bible To condemn genocide today, when the God of the Bible can command a genocide yesterday.

Speaker 1: 1:15:24

Oh, pita, it's a it's.

Speaker 2: 1:15:28

I'm like, mmm, yeah, yeah, I do condemn genocide and yeah, what do we do with those other verses? And so that's one way of dealing with this. Another way is to soften the blow and of the Old Testament Violence. So if we're saying, hey, there's all this Old Testament violence, one way is to say that's our interpretation of the Old Testament. Another way is to soften the blow and this is where I think Paul Copen and Preston Sprinkle Argue for, and they basically try to say that the Old Testament violence isn't as bad as it sounds, that that genocide in the Old Testament wasn't actually genocide when it tells you in that first same old passage to you know To kill every man, woman and child. Well, we find out later. Is you know, these tribes are still around, the Canaanites are still around them, alaklites are still around. So if they say, you know, we, we annihilated everyone, really it's.

Speaker 2: 1:16:21

It's this high, but yeah hyperbolic way of saying you know we, you know my team, won 150 to 100. I killed the other team. Well, we didn't literally kill them, but it was a way of trying to emphasize the complete, utter destruction in this way, in this regard, and so I I think that's actually probably true. So I think some of that is true, but I still don't think that deals with the bigger issue, because so if God Didn't kill thousands but only killed hundreds, it's still a problem. Like if, if you were to tell me, slim, I'm not a, I don't kill thousands of people, I've only killed three people, I'm still gonna Be a little nervous about Partnering up with you, and so I think that's that's still an issue, but I still think that's helpful. And another, another way they they try to make this argument is that you know, god is not the actor and I'm not saying this all Preston or all Paul, but I think others like this of trying to soften the blow, that God is not the main actor in these moments of wrath or of violence, and so they would argue that you know God's wrath, whenever we see it, like Romans 1, is when he chooses to let people. You know, like the worst thing God can do is give you what you absolutely want and say hand you over to your desires. It's to let Pharaoh go after his own heart. That's hardening Pharaoh's heart, is to let Pharaoh be Pharaoh, and so when he chooses to not intercede, that's God giving his wrath. And so, they would argue, you know things like the Red Sea. Well, how do you see God letting that happen? Because there's no other actors in there. He, he part of the Red Sea, but you could.

Speaker 2: 1:17:56

They would argue that. Well, the beast of the sea, they would argue, is Leviathan, and it was Leviathan that acted on the Egyptians, not God. The beast of Leviathan, the, the sea monster, the Unruly waters, are what acted on the Egyptians, not God. The flood coming and Noah was was really just the elements that took people out, not God. And so, in a sense, they, they account for the violence. Yes, and I applaud them for trying to make sure we see the heart of God in all of this, but in a sense, they're like if, if you have the power to intercede and you don't, aren't you still responsible? Isn't God still sovereign over all of this?

Speaker 1: 1:18:43

And I think that's where I'm like and the scriptural framing of I was thinking about particularly the conquest of Canaan. It's, it's, the people are explicitly Framed as instruments of God's justice. This would do to run me. Seven is about yeah, so you can't, it can't, yeah, I can't hide from that. Yeah, or say that yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:19:06

And so all of that to say? I feel like that I applaud all this and I think there's there's some truth and parts of each of these things. I just feel like all of this is forced us to deal with the tension of the Bible that, yes, there is violence in the Old Testament and there, but there's also violence in the New Testament. There's ananias and Sapphire, there's what, what is being promised in Revelation, but I think, all throughout the Bible, it's not a, it's not just discontinuity, there's also continuity In the Old Testament that there are calls to this nation-state Israel that we don't live in and how to live in this way, but there's also calls to Israel to be gracious to their enemies, to love and to care for their enemies as well. And so, both in the old and new, I think there is, you see, instead of two Testaments being so divorced from one another I think there is a coherent picture of a God who is trying to wage war against evil in all of its forms, and we see that ultimately on the cross. And so I I'm not saying I've completely dealt with all of the, the tensions there I just think we can't water down the scriptures and I feel like there's so many chances that some of these, particularly some of the ones who are saying like what's our, their misunderstanding of the, the Old Testament, I just feel like it comes up with so many ways we have to explain away God that it becomes difficult to I've to actually hold all those things in tension.

Speaker 2: 1:20:36

Also, I think of, like Marissa of Volf, who you know thought. He Said I thought I never, I could never believe in a God of justice If I hadn't lived in a war-torn Serbia and seen the horrors of humanity and the need for justice to cry out. And yet I still believe Jesus is called to non-violence and peacemaker, to love your enemy is the call for every individual question so he, like he, sees the both a God that is, a God of justice and of grace, a God of love and and, and a need to see justice being cried out and for us to be able to call and say you know, lord, deliver me for my enemies, make this right you. I've not answered all the questions. I'm just saying there's a tension there and I don't know if I have to solve that tension. Malcolm, do you have the answer?

Speaker 1: 1:21:22

I do. We'll have to solve it on our next episode, though.

Speaker 2: 1:21:25

Oh, you gotta, we gotta go.

Speaker 1: 1:21:26

It's just I, it is a. What this conversation is about is about the character of God. You talked about this briefly when we talked about About how we think of God's immutability and all these, all these kinds of things, but also whether or not people think people are asking the question, whether or not we believe in a violent God or whatever. I mean the question, the operative question is what does the, what does the conquest and the Narratives that surround it, or that, that kind of violence? What does that tell us? What does that tell us about? About, about God and one of the things that it?

Speaker 1: 1:22:07

one, one of the things that it tells us about God is how serious he is, about how serious he is about about, about justice. Even in Deuteronomy 7, when he talks about the fact he's like you gotta go kill these Amalekites, he's saying that he, he, he also tells us. People Know, therefore, that the Lord, your God, is God. He is the faithful God keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commandments.

Speaker 1: 1:22:31

Mm-hmm when the people in in Joshua 7, when Akhan takes some of the, some of the Like gold and stuff that they were supposed to destroy in Jericho, he, he places himself and all of the people of God under the curse of God. Because God is really intent on having a people who, like, on, on, on, on, on, on on on having a people who are devoted to him and the keeping of his commandment and so and so, when, so, when people are Unjust and disobedient and stuff like that, they are, they, they, they, they, they are exposing them there, they're exposing themselves to the wrath, to the wrath of the Lord, and and there and those categories are things that we get just deeply Uncomfortable about because we think that that's we, because we think that that's out of step, um, uh, with kind of what, what love is. But I think it's important, for I think I think it's important for our understanding of love to be Defined by the scriptures. So when we so, when we get to so, when we so, when we so, when we get to, so, when we get to Jesus talking about Fulfilling the law, when I think about what goes on in in Joshua, for example, that is for else, for the people of God at a very particular time, when God had to get, god was specifically giving them land and that and that was, and that was to be their land, that was theirs, where they be the people of God. There's no expansion of that land or anything like that. God told him I'll protect you, all this kind of stuff, but you but. But you need space. You need space to do the things that I'm to do, the things that I'm that, I'm that I'm calling you to do.

Speaker 1: 1:24:14

Yeah, when Christ, when Christ comes, lives, dies and is raised, he is, he is, he is. He is also telling all the people who are to are to be united and to be united and to be united To, are to be united to him. That is the church. This is to be the pattern, this is to be the pattern of your life and I'm going to give you and I'm giving you the Holy Spirit so that it can actually be the pattern of your life. So the paradigm, just the paradigm, is different when we see, when, just when we read the scriptures. That's what, that's essentially what it tells us. The paradigm, the paradigm is that that that particular paradigm for us is different.

Speaker 1: 1:24:51

Um, we can, we can talk about what that, what that means for whether or not God changes, or what, or, or, or whatever, um, but the most, but I, but I think the most important thing, the most, the most important kind of Way for us to think is you know, does this Duh? And and it goes back to that, that question that you, that you said before of of, of, what does this mean in light of Jesus? Jesus has come specifically to reveal God, yeah, and so, and, and, and that's, and that's what he did, and so if we, if we want to see the father look at, look at Jesus, yeah, um, and and if we want to know what kind of what our human life is supposed to look like, we also look at Jesus, because he's the, he's the only truly human person to ever live, to ever live, um and so um, and so we can, so we can, so we can have these. I think we can. You know, we can have these conversations and stuff, and there there are, there's a lot.

Speaker 1: 1:25:48

There's a lot is there's a lot in the bible. That's gonna make us, that's gonna make us on uncomfortable. There's also there's a significant amount of just brutality, um, in the, in the Old Testament too, but that's because human beings, because human beings are brutal, and the and and the scriptures don't, the scriptures don't, don't, don't hide, don't, don't hide that Um, but in a world of brutality, uh, we're called to be, we're called to be a people of a people of peace.

Speaker 2: 1:26:15

And that's where I think we, we, we, we land is the. You know, the. The cross does turn everything on its head. God wins by losing the. The powers lose by winning um. The powers triumph over christ on the cross was their actual defeat, and christ's defeat won him victory. Um, this is something that just, it turns everything upside down. Um, yes, jesus doesn't disown the Old Testament. Um fully embraces it.

Speaker 2: 1:26:41

Um, I think, uh, uh, north african theologian augustin, as we've talked about, he says the the new is the old concealed, the old is the new revealed. Um, is that right? Um, the new is the the old. I think it's flipped. The old is the new concealed, the new is the old revealed. And it says the Old Testament is it's not as if it's Uh, different than the new Um, but I think it's. It's the, it's the trellis, it's the scaffolding, and the new has some flesh to it and it's the. You know the bones with the flesh on it.

Speaker 2: 1:27:13

Um, and I think what we see in jesus is the full picture of god. And so, wherever these, all these, these people I I listed in their response to this, they all end up with the same response of living, a nonviolent ethic, and so we're with them on those things, because our, our struggle is not against flesh and blood, and Evil is powerful, but the dragon slayer is more powerful, and so I think that's where we want to, we want to, we want to land. Um, but, malcolm, you know what? We didn't get to?

Speaker 2: 1:27:43

which I think I can't wait for you to to school us all romans 13.

Speaker 1: 1:27:51

Yeah, we got. We got to go to romans 13 because that's that's a yeah, but we can talk about that, yeah, but what about talk about the talk about the gub, the gub mint?

Speaker 2: 1:28:01

Oh, dealer, sir, we're so thankful you're listening. If you have found any of this helpful, would you take a second to rate and review? Thank you for all the you who have done so. If you found some of this thought provoking, send it to a friend and say what do you think? Um, but also, as always, writing at hello at the lgbscom. We, I'm sure we're stirring up more and more questions for you, um, but this is something that we love to do. We love to talk about. We can't we talk about some more? Um, let me know if you want to suggest another topic, but we're gonna dig deeper on this. We're romans 13, some other spicy topics coming up. We'll see you soon, listener. Bye y'all, see y'all, oh.