Where Everybody's Crazy

Yesterday, in my Friday morning study time with my pastor, I went through the sermon I'm going to preach tomorrow. Takahashi-sensei is always surprisingly supportive of what I'm going to say, even though it's from quite a different theological place to himself.

My third-Sunday Japanese sermons are going in a series through the Gospel of Luke, which should already set liberationist alarm bells going off. As I mentioned in my previous post, the evangelical church in Japan does very little about the least of society, and I honestly believe that nothing will happen until it does. As Gordon so brilliantly put it, "as a Christian, I think we have reached a time where the Church must prove her love for people." So I've been talking about how Jesus' ministry was focussed towards the poor, the blind and the outcasts. And, incidentally, against the narrow-minded, loveless and persnickety religious establishment.

So I was quite surprised when he corrected me saying that "the Church must be downwardly mobile". (If you haven't read that essay, you must.) He gave me this brilliant piece of preaching advice:

"If you say 'the Church must...' then people will assume that it refers to the pastors, the elders, the missionaries, the building - anyone other than themselves. If you say 'Christians must...' then you make it clear that if they want to continue to be called a Christian, it has to involve them."

Again I realise how lucky I am to be training under someone this wise.

Every Friday my pastor and I meet up for a chat. We talk about theology, sociology, Japan, the Japanese church, how things are going, on so on. And we study theology together. When we first got together, we read through my dissertation on leadership together, in English, and I took the teacher role. Then after that, we read Mitsuo Fukuda's book on contextualised church together, in Japanese, and he took the teacher role. Now we're studying one of my favourite books, Bosch's "Transforming Mission." Since the Japanese translation has just come out, I'm going through it in English and he's going through it in Japanese, but since I've already read it, like, a million times, I'm taking the teacher role again.

Bosch is very influenced by the liberation movement, and I'm very influenced by Bosch, so one of the things I had to do was to try to explain why liberationism is not scary. To someone steeped in the evangelical tradition, and trained at Bible college to have a sharpened hatred of liberals, this can be pretty tricky to do. This is how I went about it.

I explained that Jesus' ministry had three main parts: (1) he preached the coming Kingdom of God; (evangelistic proclamation) (2) he taught sermons about ethics and how we should behave; (ethical teaching) (3) he healed the sick and welcomed the oppressed and challenged the corrupt structures of society. (social action)

This is quite a handy analysis in lots of ways. For instance, the evangelical Japanese church focuses on part 1. (Massive stereotypes will abound throughout this post, but that's par for the course.) But when it comes to discipleship, the focus is one part 2: now you're a Christian, these are the rules you have to follow. Part 3 is sadly absent. The liberal Japanese church focuses on part 3, but its discipleship is equally based on part 2. Part 1 is sadly absent.

For the past hundred years, the church has been running a pitched battle between Evangelicals and Liberals. The church where I come from in Oxford is very good at part 1. It tends to leave ethics, part 2, to individual conscience and the witness of the Holy Spirit, although there is some light ethical teaching. It is just about waking up to part 3. We expect Evangelicals to work in areas 1 and 2, and Liberals to work in areas 2 and 3.

The ironic thing is that the 19th and early 20th century evangelicals worked primarily in areas 1 and 3. The Clapham Sect had both a fervent belief in the power of the Kingdom of God and a consuming desire to eradicate the evil and injustice of slavery.

Digression: At Bible college, one of the things I most enjoyed was giving a tour of the college to visitors during the college's Open Day. We started in the lobby, where the windows were frosted with the crest of the Buxton family who originally owned the house. The Buxtons were classical evangelicals in the mould I have just described. Part of their coat of arms is a beer barrel. Why, I used to ask my visitors, would good Evangelical Christians have a beer barrel on their crest? The answer is this: Thomas Buxton saw that, at the time, one of the more common temptations for the poor and destitute in London was gin, and gin really rots your insides. Wanting to stop the rot, he brewed and popularised beer, which at least is not per se dangerously unhealthy. He and his friends the Guinnesses had compassion on the poor of London and in doing so changed the way Britain drinks. Next time you have a beer in the UK, raise your glass to the Buxtons and the Guinnesses, without whose Evangelical faith and Christian compassion you would probably not be drinking. End of digression.

Back to our analysis. I thought it interesting, as a back-of-an-envelope thing, to place various Christian leaders within this matrix of proclamation, teaching and action. Now I'd be the first to admit that this isn't a good way to slice and dice Christian thought. If anyone ever gives me a schema based on three axes, I'd be the first to say "Why three? Why not four? Why not seventeen?" Of course there are many more dimensions that can, and should be, added. So I am not claiming that this is the be-all-and-end-all. I'm just claiming that it opened my eyes a little.

Oh, and the other thing I should say is that most, if not all, of the leaders I placed on this diagram, I know very little about. I've never actually read a single damned thing of Luther. Most of the people on there are there due to reputation rather than due to intimate understanding of their writings and thought. We can argue about the exact placings later, if you like, but I still think it's a useful matrix for understanding people:

This exercise has given me a new respect for Wesley. And it's reminded me that I really need to do more about the Sentamu-for-Pope campaign. And of course, I am reminded that my liberationist tendencies - and my liberal tendencies - and my evangelical tendencies - all need to be brought together, and brought into the service of the One. As with all things, balance.

I'm trying to prepare a sermon for this weekend on Luke 5:27-, the call of Levi. As usual, none of the many commentaries I possess bother to think through the practical results of Jesus' call of Levi.

Here's what the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament says about Levi's job:

Since no one pays taxes willingly, people dislike and fear tax farmers. Traders run into problems at toll and customs stations. On long journeys goods are often taxed several times as they pass through various districts.

Levi is sitting in his "tax booth". This is a toll booth at the side of the road where people are taxed for their possessions as they pass by. Jesus calls Levi to leave the tax booth. There's now no-one at the toll booth, since tax collectors work alone. What this means is that Jesus has turned a toll road into a freeway. By encouraging the dereliction of duty of a tax inspector, he has undoubtedly committed revenue fraud. Funny that nobody touches on this; all the commentaries are struck dumb will how lovely it is that Jesus calls the lowest of the low in society. They don't stop to think about what happens next.

I keep trying to say that Jesus was apolitical, that his struggle was against evil and injustice and not political systems, but he keeps making it more and more difficult for me.

We speak of the Gospel as "good news". Luke's Gospel is particularly known as "good news to the poor". But if the Gospel is good news to the poor, is it not also bad news to the rich? The other day I was reading the Magnificat, and that day I went for a walk into Chalfont St Peter, a nearby village which must be one of the most wealthy areas in the country. I couldn't help thinking how difficult it must be to be a Christian there. "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." Not difficult. Impossible.

There are two types of people that Jesus rails against. The first are the religious hypocrites, typified by the Pharisees. The second are the rich. "Woe to the rich!" These are not easy or popular words, and were not when they were spoken. While the church today argues about women priests and gay bishops, it's quite ironic that the problems that Jesus spoke against - hypocrisy and wealth - have been accepted by the church for almost all of its existence. Maybe he knew something we don't.

Jesus tells the parable of the rich fool. He sends away the rich young ruler. Nearly every parable in Luke is to do with money, the rich and the poor. The poor always win and the rich always lose. Why does Jesus hate the rich so much? Is he jealous? Hasn't God given them this money to enjoy?

We don't really believe that Jesus hates the rich. We don't really believe he said "Woe to the rich". Hey, we don't really believe he said "blessed are the poor", preferring to spiritualise it to the Matthean "blessed are the poor in spirit". That one's a lot easier for us to deal with. I don't know much about hermeneutics, but I know enough to be suspicious of anything which allows us to avoid the plain sense of what Scripture is saying. Here are three more ways to avoid the idea that Jesus hates the rich. Three ways people claim you can be rich and still be a Christian:

• He didn't really say that. This is the snake's objection - "Did God really say...?" As an example of this reasoning, let's take "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." This sounds very much like Jesus is saying that a rich man cannot become a Christian. The way to explain this verse is as follows: There was a gate in the city of Jerusalem called the "eye of a needle gate", which was very narrow, and through which you had to enter very carefully. Jesus was saying that a rich man could only become a Christian very carefully. There's only one problem with this idea. There was no such gate in Jerusalem. That explanation was completely made up as a way to avoid the plain sense of the words. In reality, Jesus was actually saying that a rich man cannot become a Christian. Oh, we don't like that.
• It's not the money, it's what we do with it. So long as we have the right approach to our money, we're OK. There's only one problem with that. Jesus didn't say "Woe to those who are rich and abuse their money." He said "Woe to the rich". God will send the rich empty away, not the rich and foolish. It may offend our sensibilities that Jesus saw riches as evil in themselves, but he did. It probably went down as badly then as it does now. To assume that Jesus meant "rich and profligate" is to read into the Bible what is not there, in another attempt to avoid the plain sense of the words. In reality, Jesus was of the opinion that riches themselves corrupt, not our attitude to them. Oh, we don't like that either.
• "Same to you, pal". It's hard for me to tell others about Jesus' hatred for riches when I'm so rich myself, compared to the vast majority of the world. Well, yes. That is my problem. I find it a huge challenge, I shall have to deal with my problem. That does not diminish your problem, though.

To be honest, I pity the rich - they cannot enter the kingdom of heaven; Jesus said so. I cannot do what he did, and accept their hospitality while maintaining the integrity to criticise them harshly at the same time. But I do know that being around the rich really does help me love the poor.