Tuesday 18 December 2007

One more look at Brian Blount's comments about homosexuality and the New Testament.



What I'm suggesting, of course, is that contextuality is not only important when we compare Paul to our time but also it is important - indeed, imperative - when we compare Paul to the Paul of his own time. When the contextual base of his theology shifts, so does the emphasis in his ethics. When the theology operates from the radical thing that God has done through Christ Jesus, then boundaries break down and people rise up and are brought together. This is Paul's living word, the one that continues into our own time and gives us hope for the way in which all people who have been created as God has created them, just as they are, might be treated equally and accepted faithfully together in the one body of faith.



Here that notion of living word is quite important. Even for Paul, the word brought life and was life and it created life...that was not yet the life of the blossoming community. In Christ, Jesus, Paul's world is shaken up...again and again. This living word is the one that then shakes us up. When that happens, it is a shaking that may rock our lives in ways not possible in Paul's context but very much a part of the radical word that continues to break into our day and bring life that will continue to reshape the community of the followers of Jesus. Part of our faithful journey with this word that continues to come alive among us is that we may well find ourselves surprised by the life it whips up for us. We do not simply go on our own merry way, we follow this Word and we take note of how it shakes the foundations upon which we want to rest...it shakes them otherwise this living may become nothing more than another dead word among us and within our context. It must be noted that we are the ones who make it that dead word...for this Word is to always and will always bring life.



Connection: Faithful people must deal with context. Today is always the right time to question how this Word will witness to the expansive grace of our God.



In this season of Advent, O God, stir us up by the power of your Spirit so that as we engage our world this day we will see how your Christ comes to be among us and how in the coming of the Christ, we are shaped to bring that Reigning life into the world with us. Amen.