Some of the Spirit’s supernatural gifts.

1 Corinthians 12.4-11.

When the apostles Paul and Sosthenes corrected the church of Corinth regarding the supernatural—in particular about the gifts the Holy Spirit distributes to his church—the apostles listed a few of these gifts. Didn’t define ’em; just listed ’em.

Nothing wrong with that. But the problem is cessationists, those Christians who believe God turned off the miracles once the New Testament was complete. So what do they do with Paul and Sosthenes’s list of supernatural gifts? They redefined every last one of them: They’re no longer supernatural, but natural. They’re the same sort of gifts any “gifted person,” any talented individual, any genius, might happen to have. Like perfect pitch, or instant recall, or the ability to do rapid math in your head, or amazing physical coordination. Hey, it’s not like the Creator doesn’t grant natural gifts!

So in a cessationist’s mind, the 1 Corinthians passages aren’t at all about supernatural gifts empowered by the Holy Spirit, but how God’s blessed his church with really talented people. Great preachers, musicians, artists, handymen. You know, like when the LORD instructed Moses to build a tabernacle, and “gifted” this one particular craftsman to do it just the way the LORD wanted it.

Exodus 31.1-5 KJV

1 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, 2 See, I have called by name Bezaleel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the tribe of Judah: 3 and I have filled him with the spirit of God, in wisdom, and in understanding, and in knowledge, and in all manner of workmanship, 4 to devise cunning works, to work in gold, and in silver, and in brass, 5 and in cutting of stones, to set them, and in carving of timber, to work in all manner of workmanship.

Even gave Betsalél (KJV “Bezaleel”) a Spirit-empowered assistant, Oholiáv ben Akhisamákh. Ex 31.6 and together they could make anything. And did. Ex 38.22

But no, 1 Corinthians isn’t about getting way-better-than-average earthly abilities from God. It’s about getting unearthly abilities. Stuff nobody can naturally do. Stuff which proves the Holy Spirit is living and active among us, ’cause skeptical pagans can’t just brush these things off as the talented acts of clever people. They’re forced into a dilemma: Either God’s really among us, or it’s deception or self-delusion. Either he’s real or fake.

So here’s the list the apostles gave in 1 Corinthians—and the rubbish redefinitions which cessationists made up for ’em.

1 Corinthians 12.4-11 KWL

4 There are a diversity of supernatural things, and the same Holy Spirit.

5 A diversity of ministries, and the same Lord.

6 A diversity of activities, and the same God activating all in all.

7 Each individual is given a different revelation of the Spirit—to bring us together.

8 For by the Spirit, while a word of wisdom is given to one,

by the same Spirit, a word of knowledge is given to another.

9 By the same Spirit, to someone else, faith.

By the one Spirit, to another, healing gifts.

10 To another, powerful activity.

To another, prophecy.

To another, judgment of spiritual things.

To someone else, families of tongues.

To another, interpretation of tongues.

11 One and the same Spirit acts in all these things,

dividing them to each of his own people however he wants.

It’s not a comprehensive list. It’s not meant to be; there are plenty of precedents for other supernatural behaviors elsewhere in the bible. But this’ll get us started.

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The Holy Spirit and the supernatural.

1 Corinthians 12.1-7.

SUPERNATURAL su.pər'nætʃ(.ə).rəl noun. Event caused by (or credited to) some force beyond scientific understanding, beyond natural laws.

If you wanna get technical, whenever anyone interferes with the natural course of events, it’s more-than-natural. It’s supernatural.

Fr’instance if I install plastic pink flamingos in my front yard. Clearly they aren’t the product of Mommy plastic flamingo and Daddy plastic flamingo loving one another very much, and giving one another a special kind of “hug.” Nor did they sprout up from the ground like mutant orchids. Somebody—really a whole bunch of somebodies—drilled for petroleum, extracted the plastic, colored it pink, molded it into a flamingo shape, and painted it to resemble a living flamingo. Somebody else—i.e. me—lost all sense of what’s appropriate for lawn ornaments, bought them, put ’em in the lawn, and got all the neighbors to seriously consider banding together in a homeowner’s association just to ban ’em. Other than the outrage, none of this happened naturally.

But we tend to call this behavior unnatural, not supernatural. We save the term “supernatural” for stuff which, we suspect, wasn’t done by humans, nor done by our robots. If a sasquatch started leaving pink flamingos around town, or space aliens, or spirits, vampires, inexplicably hyper-intelligent raccoons… well we’d be weirded out by the very idea of non-human intelligences, and call ’em supernatural. ’Cause they’re not natural!

But y’notice all these “supernatural” beings are creatures most people don’t believe in, or won’t admit to believing in, or insist no reasonable person would believe in. So “supernatural” tends to have a sense of ridiculousness attached to it. No sane person should believe in the supernatural, right? Those things aren’t real. Con artists claim to believe in them, but they’re just trying to dupe people into giving them money.

And I get that; I don’t believe in sasquatches either. But just because frauds and the defrauded use a word, doesn’t mean it’s not a valid word. There’s real supernatural in the universe.

Namely God.

When God creates something from scratch, fixes what’s broken, cures the sick, shares unknowable things through his prophets, or otherwise does stuff we can’t adequately explain through science and physics, “supernatural” is the proper term for it. Miracles are supernatural.

Now certainly God can, and does, use physics to do as he does. When he parted the Red Sea for Moses and the Hebrews, he didn’t do it as shown in The Ten Commandments; a wind blew all night and blew back the water. Ex 14.21 Skeptics like to point to this natural-sounding description in Exodus, and claim it suggests maybe God wasn’t involved, and like to “debunk” the bible’s miracles by trying to explain the physics behind ’em. But some miracles just plain defy explanation. Like when God made an axehead float, 2Ki 6.1-7 when Jesus and Peter walked on water, and certainly every time someone got raptured. Natural explanations or not, these events don’t have a natural cause. They’re supernatural.

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The Dinner Party Story.

Luke 14.15-24.

Jesus has two very similar parables in the gospels: The Wedding Party Story in Matthew, and the Dinner Party Story in Luke. Christians tend to lump ’em together, iron out the differences, and claim they’re about precisely the same thing. They’re actually not. The differences are big enough to where we gotta look at the variant parables individually, not together.

In the Wedding Party Story, Jesus compares his kingdom to a king holding a wedding for his son. That’s not a mere social function; it’s political. People’s response to that wedding was a political statement; it wasn’t merely some friends revealing how they’re not really friends. Whereas what we see in the Dinner Party Story is an act of hospitality, generosity, and love on the homeowner’s part… and the invitees blow him off because they’d rather do anything than spend time with him. The rebellion and sedition we detect in the Wedding Party Story isn’t in this story. These are just people being dicks to a guy who just wants their company.

God just wants to love his people, and give us his kingdom. And his people would honestly rather do anything else.

Luke 14.15-24 KWL

15 Someone who was reclining at dinner with Jesus, hearing this,

told him, “How awesome for whoever will eat bread in God’s kingdom!”

16 Jesus told him, “Some person was having a large dinner party, and invited many.

17 He sent his slave to tell the invited at the dinner hour, ‘Come! It’s ready now!’

18 And every one of them began to excuse himself.

The first told him, ‘I bought a field.

I seriously need to go out and see it. I pray you, have me excused.’

19 Another said, ‘I bought five teams of oxen.

I have to try them out. I pray you, have me excused.’

20 Another said, ‘I married a woman, and this is why I can’t come.’

21 Coming back, the slave reported these things to his master.

Then the enraged homeowner told his slave, ‘Go out quickly to the city’s squares and alleys,

and the poor, maimed, blind, and disabled: Bring them here!’

22 The slave said, ‘Master, I did as you ordered, and there’s still room.’

23 The master told the slave, ‘Go out of the city to the roads and property lines,

and make people come, so my house can be full!

24 For I tell you none of those invited men will taste my dinner.’ ”

Now y’notice the consequences of rejecting the dinner party are way less extreme than we see in the Wedding Party Story. In Matthew the king who throws the wedding party burns down a few cities, then has an underdressed guest hogtied and thrown out. Whereas in Luke the homeowner who throws the dinner party simply says, “None of those invited men will taste my dinner.” They’re not gonna be dead, nor cast into outer darkness where “there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” Mt 22.13 They’re only gonna miss out on a really nice meal.

Crummy friends with crummy excuses.

The dinner party host invites his guests to dinner, and it’s a μέγα/méga dinner. Yep, it’s the same word in both Greek and English: It’s big. It’s important. It’s the sort of dinner where he’d’ve been an idiot had he not confirmed they were coming, because he prepared a lot of food, and there were no refrigerators back then, so it had to be eaten that day. He fully expected they’d come—and they begged off with some really lame excuses.

There are no cultural reasons why they can’t make it to dinner. I’ve heard people actually try to defend these guests—“Well if an ancient Israeli bought land, he was legally obligated to go inspect it.” No he wasn’t. Not in the Law, not in Pharisee tradition; he could’ve purchased it sight unseen, and never visited it, if he so chose. True, some purchases were contingent on the buyer seeing the property, same as now, but there’s no reason to presume this was that. The way Jesus tells the story, everybody’s backing out for weak reasons, and this is meant to be interpreted as one of those weak reasons.

Likewise the guy who just bought five teams of oxen: Yes, 10 oxen is a major purchase. Yes he should try them out to make sure they’ll plow his fields properly. But this being case, why’d he inconveniently schedule his purchase so he can’t make it to the dinner party? This wasn’t a surprise purchase—“Wait, I gotta harvest my crops next week? I had no idea! Well I’d better buy some oxen right now!” Plus there’s no way he could drive five teams by himself: He had to have at least four other guys in his employ who could drive the other teams while he did. And shouldn’t any of those other guys be fully capable of testing out his oxen for him?

Lastly the guy who just got married. Okay, verse 24 refers to “none of those invited men,” which suggests the host only invited men. So some folks have claimed this was a men’s-only dinner, and the newlywed might’ve wanted to bring his wife, which seems like a valid enough reason to beg off the dinner. But I doubt it. In patriarchal cultures, if you wanted to formally invite a woman to a social function, you invited her patriarch, and implied to him that he oughta bring her. If he didn’t care to personally attend, he’d send her with a chaperone. But in any event men didn’t formally invite women to dinner parties. Informally maybe, but this wasn’t meant to be mistaken for an informal dinner. There were invitations.

Really, it was because the newlywed didn’t want to take a break from romping with the new wife, and go have dinner. No self-control on his part. Most of us can understand that, but still.

So everybody bailed on the host, and he was understandably enraged: He spent a lot of money on food and food prep, and now it would go uneaten, and go to waste. But no it wouldn’t: “Go out quickly to the city’s squares and alleys,” he instructed his slave, “and the poor, maimed, blind, and disabled: Bring them here!” Lk 14.21 Go get people whom the host knew would be hungry, and appreciate his hospitality.

The Dinner Party Story comes right after Jesus gave this teaching:

Luke 14.12.14 KWL

12 Jesus also said to those who invited him, “Whenever you have a lunch or dinner,

don’t invite your friends, siblings, relatives, or rich neighbors,

lest they invite you in return, to repay you.

13 Instead whenever you have a feast, invite the poor, maimed, disabled, blind,

14 and you’ll be awesome, because they have no way to repay you,

for you’ll be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”

Jesus lists the very same disadvantaged folks in both his lesson and this story: The poor, maimed, blind, and disabled. Not in the same order, but they’re the same words. People who can’t possibly practice reciprocity, because they can’t throw a dinner party. But that’s okay. You’re not doing it for payback. You’re doing it to be awesome.

Apparently this dinner was so mega, they ran out of poor people in the city! Or at least poor people who would accept a free meal. You probably know people who absolutely refuse to accept anything for free—including grace—because they feel they should earn everything they have, and owe no one anything, nor be in any kind of karmic debt whatsoever. It’s a pride thing. But in my experience, the reason God lets some people be poor and stay poor is because he’s trying to break that pride off them… ’cause if he ever gives such people money, they’re gonna be so insufferably stingy.

Anyway the host had to order his slave “to the roads and property lines” (KJV “the highways and hedges”) —to places which’d be outside the city gates, where he might find people on their way to town, who might be tired and hungry and in need of a good meal, and here was a really good meal! The invitation was now extended, not just to the poor and needy who might know who the host was, but to strangers who might not. But that’s okay; there was plenty of food.

Spite and God’s kingdom.

Okay, time to address the elephant in the room. That last comment the host makes, “For I tell you none of those invited men will taste my dinner,” Lk 14.24 sounds just a bit spiteful. Or at least many a preacher has phrased it that way. Those guys who passed on dinner are totally gonna miss out.

And historically, spiteful preachers have interpreted it that very way. They claim the dinner is God’s kingdom, and the invited people who passed on dinner were God’s chosen people, the Jews. But because the Jews rejected Jesus, none of them are gonna inherit God’s kingdom. Because doesn’t the host in this story say so? “None of those invited men” means none of the Jews, right?

But it’s a ridiculous assumption, because all the first Christians were Jews. All the authors of the New Testament were either Jews by ancestry or (in Luke’s case) conversion. There are still tons of Christians of Jewish descent. Jesus is no antisemite; he’s the king of the Jews! It’s all kinds of stupid to apply antisemitic ideas to his teachings.

But there’s spite, and there’s spite. The word spite actually has two definitions.

SPITE spaɪt noun. A desire to hurt, offend, or annoy someone else.

2. Without regard for the wishes of someone else.

The first definition means we wanna poke someone in the feelings. The second doesn’t necessarily. It might poke them; it might enrage them. It might not. But either way, we’re doing as we’re doing, despite them, or in spite of them. It’s not the harmful sort of spite; it’s the passive sort.

God does the passive sort all the time. Plenty of people don’t want him to do as he’s doing. They don’t want him to love and bless the people they hate. They don’t want him to overthrow their favorite institutions. They don’t want him to intervene in their affairs. They don’t want him! And a lot of times, he’ll give them what they want, and give ’em space. But when their selfish desires start to harm others, especially the needy, he’s gonna intervene; he won’t stand by forever. He’s our savior, y’know. He’ll save people in spite of their haters. Not to deliberately enrage them, even though God knows they’ll be enraged. (And even though God’s people, who are way less kind than God is, will kinda enjoy their rage.)

Is the host being spiteful to his invited guests? Yes, but I would argue it’s the passive sort of spite. They bailed on his dinner because they don’t really care about him, and offered lame excuses because they wanted him to know they don’t really care about him. But rather than dwell on their offensive behavior, he threw his dinner party all the same. Rather than be frustrated he didn’t have enough guests, he went out and got plenty of guests. Rather than be miserable and not enjoy himself, I’m pretty sure he enjoyed himself a great deal. Generosity is fun!

None of this was to make the invited people miserable; I doubt the host cared whether his invitees were miserable. He had other things to focus on. Like making sure he had enough wine for all his new guests. Making sure they weren’t hesitant about eating as much as they liked. Being a good host in general.

God’s kingdom is like this host’s generosity. Everybody’s invited. Not everybody’s gonna accept the invitation. But if they think God’s gonna wallow in misery about their rejection, he really won’t; he’s gonna grant his kingdom to all sorts of people who don’t deserve it, including strangers and gentiles who never initially expected to be included. It’ll be awesome.

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The Expositor’s Bible Commentary.

Years ago my mom was taking a college course in bible, and one of her texts was The Expositor’s Bible Commentary. Full 13-volume set; they didn’t want people getting the two-volume abridged edition. I don’t remember how much it was at the time, but it was way more than she was willing to spend. So she figured, “Well my son’s a big bible nerd,” and asked me, “Wanna go halves on a commentary set?” It was easy to talk her into the Accordance version, which was a lot cheaper, a lot easier to search… and I could stash it on a laptop instead of having it hog a whole shelf.

I’ve known pastors who had the whole 13-volume set in their offices. I don’t know how regularly they flipped through it for their sermon prep. From the many out-of-context scriptures they used, sounds like they really didn’t. But displaying full commentary sets in your office, preferably without a thick layer of dust on top, certainly makes you look like you study the bible in depth.

The EBC began as The Expositor’s Bible, produced in 1903 in Scotland by Sir William Robertson Nicoll of the Scottish Free Church. Many Scottish churches at the time were big on expository sermons and writing—in which you go through a passage and analyze each individual verse, one at a time. (And hopefully don’t go on wild tangents, or use them as jumping-off points for your own rants, like some “expositors” I could mention.) Bible commentaries usually do this very same thing, but not always; Nicholl’s commentary certainly did. Many of the volume authors are the same guys who helped produce the Scottish volumes of the Early Church Fathers.

Did you want a copy? StudyLight.org hosts the entire thing on their site. And here are links to every volume on Project Gutenberg. Yeah, they lack the past century of archaeological discoveries, and redevelopments in Christian thought, but they still have plenty to chew on. So here you go.

• Index, by S.G. Ayres.
• Genesis, by Marcus Dods.
• Exodus, by G.A. Chadwick.
• Leviticus, by S.H. Kellogg.
• Numbers, by Robert A. Watson.
• Deuteronomy, by Andrew Harper.
• Joshua, by William Garden Blaikie.
• Judges and Ruth, by Robert A. Watson.
• 1 Samuel and 2 Samuel, by William Garden Blaikie.
• 1 Kings and 2 Kings, by F.W. Farrar.
• 1-2 Chronicles, by William Henry Bennett.
• Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther, by Walter F. Adeney.
• Job, by Robert Watson.
• Psalms, vol. 1, vol. 2, and vol. 3, by Alexander Maclaren.
• Proverbs, by R.F. Horton.
• Ecclesiastes, by Samuel Cox.
• Song of Solomon, by Walter F. Adeney.
• Isaiah, vol. 1 and vol. 2, by George Adam Smith.
• Jeremiah, by William Henry Bennett.
• The Prophecies of Jeremiah, by C.J. Ball.
• Ezekiel, by John Skinner.
• Daniel, by F.W. Farrar.
• The Twelve Prophets, vol. 1 and vol. 2, by George Adam Smith.
• Matthew, by John Monro Gibson.
• Mark, by G.A. Chadwick.
• Luke, by Henry Burton.
• John, vol. 1 and vol. 2, by Marcus Dods.
• Acts, vol. 1 and vol. 2, by G.T. Stokes.
• Romans, by H.C.G. Moule.
• 1 Corinthians, by Marcus Dods.
• 2 Corinthians, by James Denney.
• Galatians, by G.G. Findlay.
• Ephesians, by G.G. Findlay.
• Philippians, by Robert Rainy.
• Colossians and Philemon, by Alexander Maclaren.
• 1-2 Thessalonians, by James Denney.
• The Pastoral Epistles, by Alfred Plummer.
• Hebrews, by Thomas Charles Edwards.
• James and Jude, by Alfred Plummer.
• 1-2 Peter, by J. Rawson Lumby.
• 1-3 John, by William Alexander.
• Revelation, by William Milligan.

Read the whole thing! ➡️

Timekeeping in ancient Israel.

The calendar most of the planet uses, called either the western calendar or the Gregorian calendar, originated in 1582 when Pope Gregory 13 introduced it as an update of the Roman calendar adopted by Julius Caesar in 45BC. Since Gregory introduced it right after the Protestant split, it took a while before all Protestant countries adopted it. Various Orthodox churches still haven’t adopted it, preferring to stick with Caesar’s calendar, ’cause it’s not Catholic. Meanwhile nations which aren’t even predominantly Christian—’cause of western influences or trade—do use it. As well as their own local calendars. Japan, fr’instance.

Israel likewise uses the western calendar. And its local calendar, the one which predates the western calendar by centuries: The Hebrew calendar.

That’s the calendar we find in the bible. It’s what we call a lunisolar calendar: It’s lunar, in that months start on the new moon. But it’s adjusted to sync up with solar years, so that the year always begins in spring, round the time of the vernal equinox, and doesn’t drift too far away from it.

The Hebrew calendar actually predates the Hebrews. It was used all over the ancient middle east, including by the Assyrians and Babylonians who conquered Israel. The Hebrew calendar’s months all have Assyrian names—although a few of the original Canaanite names slipped into the bible:

1. אָבִיב/Avív (“green”), the first month. Ex 12.2, 13.4 Tel Aviv (KJV “Telabib”) in Babylon Ek 3.15 was named for it; Tel Aviv in Israel is named for that.
2. זִֽו/Ziv (“bright”), the second month. 1Ki 6.1
7. אֵיתָניִם/Eytaním (“strong ones”), the seventh month. 1Ki 8.2
8. בּוּל/Bul (“produce”), the eighth month. 1Ki 6.38

Otherwise the scriptures simply called the months “third month,” “fifth month,” and so forth. (Like September/seventh month, October/eighth month, and so on… and yeah they aren’t the seventh and eighth month, but blame Gregory for that.) We don’t know what the ancient Canaanite names were. No doubt many months were named for pagan gods, just like the Roman calendar, so the Hebrews didn’t care to use or record them.

In any event here are the current names.

MONTH	DAYS	WHEN	BIBLE HOLIDAYS
ניִסָן Nisán	30	Spring: Mid-March to mid-April	Passover
אִיָּר Iyyár	29	Mid-spring: Mid-April to mid-May
סִיוָן Siván	30	Late spring: Mid-May to mid-June	Shavuót (Pentecost)
תַּמּוּז Tammúz	29	Summer: Mid-June to mid-July
אָב Av	30	Mid-summer: Mid-July to mid-August
אֱלוּל Elúl	29	Late summer: Mid-August to mid-September
תִּשׁרִי Tišreí	30	Fall: Mid-September to mid-October	Yom Kippur, Sukkot
מַרְחֶשְׁוָן Markhéšvan	29/30	Mid-fall: Mid-October to mid-November
כִּסְלֵו Khislév	29/30	Late fall: Mid-November to mid-December	Hanukkah
טֵבֶת Tevét	29	Winter: Mid-December to mid-January
שְׁבָט Ševát	30	Mid-winter: Mid-January to mid-February
אֲדָר Adár	29/30	Late winter: Mid-February to mid-March	Purim

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Keep (most of) your prayers private.

Matthew 6.5-6.

In his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus taught,

Matthew 6.5-6 KJV

5 And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward. 6 But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.

Which is why we don’t see the streets of our nation lined with Christians, their arms raised and heads to the sky, praying as loud as possible so as to let everyone know we’re devout, and that we’re praying for our land.

Well… we don’t usually see this. Although I remember this one trip I made to Washington D.C. where we saw it all the time. I was chaperoning some kids on a civics tour, where we went to the Capitol, the Washington Monument, the Lincoln Memorial, the Smithsonian, and all sorts of public buildings. And wouldn’t you know it: In every last one of these places, there were Christian groups, praying good ’n loud for the United States. If you didn’t know they were Christian by their behavior, you’d definitely know it by their very public prayers.

Various Christian organizations also put together days of prayer, or prayer breakfasts, or get high schoolers to gather at the flagpole to pray, or get concerned citizens to show up at all the city halls to pray. Sometimes they’re protesting something; sometimes they’re in favor of something; either way they pray. Publicly. Loudly. For all to see and hear.

There’s the occasional athlete who takes a knee every time he scores a goal. And there are the folks who pitch a fit because public schoolteachers can’t lead the kids in prayer. As someone who grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area in the 1970s, I should point out this is more of a blessing than you realize: I’d’ve been exposed to all sorts of weird pagan prayers had my teachers been required to lead prayer time. It’s not at all like the Bible Belt, where the pagans have way more practice at pretending to be Christian.

Back in 2008, during a major economic recession, Texas prophet Cindy Jacobs led a prayer team to New York City to lead a Day of Prayer for the World’s Economies. They were gonna pray for the financial institutions who caused suffered from the recession, and pray for God to take ’em over. Which is fine, but here’s what happened.

I recall the Hebrews got in big trouble for doing something like this. Wonkette

On Wall Street there’s a statue of a bull, meant to represent an active, “bullish” economy. The prayer team chose to lay their hands upon it and pray. My very first thought upon seeing this photo: “Good Lord, they’re praying over a golden calf. Um… didn’t the LORD smite the Hebrews for that?” Ex 32.35

Okay, they meant well. But the prayer team didn’t bother to think about how their actions looked—or didn’t care, figuring their good intentions outweighed how foolish they looked. ’Cause pagans have seen The Ten Commandments, and know that golden calf story. And sure had a lot of fun with it.

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Hatred’s a work of the flesh.

Galatians 5.19-21 KJV

19 Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, 20 idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, 21 envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.

Hatred gets listed in verse 20 as one of the works of the flesh. The original-language word is ἔχθραι/ékhthre, “hostility” or “opposition” or “enmity”: Someone who’s decided in advance they’re not gonna be friendly. In fact, they’re looking for enemies.

In his first letter, John pointed out how those who hate their sisters or brothers are murderers. In their hearts, such people are dead to them. And those who “murder” in this way have nothing to do with eternal life. 1Jn 3.15 They won’t inherit God’s kingdom—same as those who exhibit the fleshly works which Paul listed.

Yeah, you know we’ve got a lot of such people all over Christianity. I follow a few of their blogs. They claim they’re all about Christian holiness and sanctification; about Christians following Jesus instead of the rest of the world, and becoming a pure, sinless, spotless church, ready and eager to greet Jesus at his second coming. But the way they go about doing it is to bring up the latest popular sin (typically one committed by members of the opposition party), then pound away at it like a carpenter trying to put thin nails into thick wood.

Yes, Christians oughta resist temptation and stop sinning. Of course. Duh. But these guys’ fixation on dirty, dirty sins? It’s not healthy. Much as these guys love to quote this memory verse—

Philippians 4.8 KJV

Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.

—the amount of time they spend digging through the news to find new things to be horrified by, the length of time they spend denouncing these travesties, and the angst and tears and hand-wringing and stress they suffer just thinking about how these evils damage our good Christian nation…

Yep, these guys aren’t actually avoiding sin. They may not be committing it, nor even be tempted to try it, but their minds are nonetheless stewing in it like shrimp in a gumbo. Because what they’re doing instead is hating it. Hating it with every fiber of their being. In so doing their minds are wholly fixated on whatsoever things are false, dishonest, unfair, impure, ugly, disturbing, useless, and wrong.

Hopefully they’re not doing this 24 hours a day, like pundits who are desperately looking for new content with which they can outrage their TV audience. But y’know, some of them are. You can tell whenever you talk with them: The first thing they want to talk about is the latest outrage. And they’re hoping it’ll outrage you too. Bad fruit likes to spread its seeds widely.

Read the whole thing! ➡️

The Equal-Pay Vineyard Story.

Matthew 20.1-16.

Jesus tells more than one parable about vineyards, and sometimes Christians mix ’em up. Whenever I refer to “the parable of the vineyard,” people sometimes assume I mean the two sons sent to work in the vineyard, or the tenant farmers who murder the vineyard owner’s son. I’ve tried to call this the Generous Employer Story, but if you don’t put “vineyard” in the title people don’t know what you mean—“Wait, is this a new parable?” No it’s not.

So I call it the Equal-Pay Vineyard Story. Because everybody gets paid a denarius at the end of the story, even though some of ’em didn’t work all that hard. The punchline is about how the landowner does this because he’s generous, so maybe it oughta be called the Generous Equal-Pay Vineyard Story. But instead of making the title longer and longer, till it winds up telling the story for us, Jesus may as well tell the story, right?

Matthew 20.1-16 KWL

1 “For heaven’s kingdom is like a person, a landowner,

who comes out first thing in the morning [6AM] to hire workers for his vineyard.

2 Once the workers agree to a denarius for the day,

he sends them to his vineyard.

3 Going out the third hour, [9AM] he sees others loitering in the square

4 and tells them, ‘You can also go to the vineyard,

and I’ll give you whatever might be fair.’

5 He goes away again, and comes back out at the sixth [12PM] and ninth hour, [3PM]

and does the same thing.

6 Around the 11th hour, [5PM] he comes out to find others standing around,

and tells them, ‘Why are you standing here idle all day?’

7 They tell him this: ‘Nobody has hired us.’

He tells them, ‘You can also go to the vineyard.’

8 When evening comes, [6PM] the vineyard’s master tells his vineyard manager,

‘Call the workers, to give them their pay—

starting with the last, till you get to the first.’

9 Each of those who came at the 11th hour gets a denarius.

10 So the first to come, thought they would get more—

and each of them also gets a denarius.

11 Those who got paid last grumble against the landowner,

12 saying, ‘These last-hired worked one hour, and were paid as much as we?

Those who bore the weight of the day, and the heat?’

13 In reply, the landowner says to one of them,

‘Friend, I’ve not wronged you. Didn’t you agree with me to work for a denarius?

14 Take your denarius and go.

I want to give this last-hired what I also gave you.

15 Or is this not allowed me?—to do as I want with what’s mine?

Or is your eye evil, because I am good?’

16 In this way the last will be first,

and the first, last.”

I translated “is your eye evil” Mt 20.15 literally. But just to remind you, the “evil eye” has nothing to do with cursing anyone, like our culture has it. To ancient Hebrews it was an idiom meaning “greedy person.” And there are a lot of greedy people, both back then and now, whose Mammonism gets triggered every time they see generosity. They rage whenever someone gets a massive paycheck, whether it be a CEO who gets an outrageous bonus, or an entry-level employee who makes way more than minimum wage: “He doesn’t deserve that,” or “Why are you paying your people so much?” or “Any moron could do that job; how dare you overpay morons?” They’re as enraged as if it personally harms them for others to prosper. It’s karmic thinking, and wholly inappropriate behavior for Christians. And Jews. But it’s everywhere, so Jesus includes it in his story.

Read the whole thing! ➡️

The explosive power of God?

DYNAMIS 'daɪ.nə.mɪs, 'di.na.mis or DUNAMIS 'du'nə.mɪs noun. The extra-mighty sort of power God possesses.

[Dynamite power 'daɪ.nə.maɪt 'paʊ(.ə)r noun.]

Alexander Pope wrote the saying, “A little learning is a dangerous thing,” in his Essay on Criticism in 1711. It’s frequently misquoted “A little knowledge is a dangerous thing,” and constantly taken out of context: People assume Pope meant it’s better to have no knowledge at all. Knowledge is power, but power in the wrong hands is dangerous.

Read his whole poem, and you learn what Pope actually meant:

A little learning is a dang’rous thing;

Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian Spring:

There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,

And drinking largely sobers us again.

Yeah, for those who lack a little learning about what a Pierian Spring is, that’d be a fountain in ancient Macedonia (which is not the current country of Macedonia) dedicated to the Muses, the Greek goddesses of wisdom and talent. Drink from the spring, and you’re supposed to gain their wisdom, and be able to understand profound truths. But if you don’t take a big drink from it—if you only take little sips from a 6-ounce Dixie cup—you’re not getting a full dose of wisdom. You’re only getting tiny but partial insights. Only half-truths.

That’s what Pope considered dangerous: A little learning. A partial knowledge. Don’t be satisfied with tricks or trivia. Dig deeper.

One obvious example is what popular Christianity claims about “dynamis power.” I first heard it before I went to seminary and learned Greek. I’ve heard it countless times since.

Pastors are impressed by how similar the word δύναμις/dýnamis is to our English word dynamite. And of course it’s similar. After Alfred Nobel patented “Nobel’s Blasting Powder” in 1867, he decided to give it a more clever name: The Greek word for power, plus -ite. So it’s not a coincidence the two words are similar. Fully deliberate on Nobel’s part.

So these pastors will spend a lot of time on “the dýnamis power of God” (or dúnamis, depending on whether they know an upsilon is pronounced i instead of u, and usually they don’t). They’ll spend a lot of time on how dynamic or dynamite it is. Or as one of my pastors loved to put it, “the dynamite power of God!” ’Cause once the Holy Spirit gets in there and does something, BOOM!

It’s an exciting image. It’s that excitement which indicates someone’s been sipping from the spring of knowledge again. Not drinking deep.

When I first heard this idea, I thought it sounded clever. But what did I know? I hadn’t learned any Greek yet. And even for quite a few years after my Greek classes, I perpetuated the error: God’s power is ’splodey like dynamite. But one Sunday 14 years ago, after yet another sermon on the explosive power of God, I decided to finally double-check the idea against a Greek dictionary. And as you can guess, no that’s not what dýnamis means.

Read the whole thing! ➡️

Defining God by his might, instead of his love.

People have all sorts of ideas about what a god is. To the ancients, a god was simply a non-human being who was mightier than they, who had power over nature, and if you worshiped them they might control some nature for you. To present-day westerners, whose ideas of God have largely been influenced by Christianity, God is properly defined as the mightiest being the universe. The Almighty. Nothing and no one comes close.

Which he is, but people tend to fixate on that definition instead of God’s own description of himself—as love.

Exodus 34.6-7 KJV

6 And the LORD passed by before him, and proclaimed, The LORD, The LORD God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, 7 keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children’s children, unto the third and to the fourth generation.

It’s kinda obvious why: Humans covet power. And God’s all-powerful. So, same as with the ancients and their gods, we figure if we suck up to God just right, he might use his power on our behalf. Even grant us a little power.

So whenever Christians write theology books, and start writing about the attributes of God, that’s where we typically start: God is almighty. God is the Almighty. He’s El Šaddaý, God Almighty; El Elyón, the Most High; El Jefe, the Boss. (Okay, that last one’s Spanish, not Hebrew, but he is.) And then we go into detail about all the ways he’s almighty, usually with Latin-derived words beginning with omni-. He’s omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient, omnidirectional, omnivorous… well, considering he discouraged the Hebrews from certain ritually unclean animals, maybe not omnivorous; Jesus didn’t eat shellfish. But those theology books surely do pound away at the omnis. Because we’d surely like to be omni.

And sometimes speculate what it’d be like to be omnipotent. Could God really do anything? Really anything?

SHE. “God is almighty, right? So could he create a rock so heavy, he can’t lift it?”

ME. “Yes. Of course he could create such a rock.”

SHE. [figuring she got me] “But if he can’t lift it, then is he really almighty? Is he really God?”

ME. “Well first of all, God isn’t defined by his almightiness. But second of all, it’s a poor sort of almightiness that can’t create paradoces.”

Yeah, this person didn’t realize this wasn’t my first go-around with this particular question. I grew up inflicting it on my Sunday school teachers, just to see whether I liked any of their answers. (Seldom did I.) Theology professors still use it to mess with the minds of their students. I came up with my own answer back in seminary, just to mess with the minds of my theology professors.

But the reason Christians confound themselves with the paradox of truly being able to do anything—including contradictory things, however much that might bend our brains—is because we love the idea our God can do anything, and wanna explore that idea. Explore it a lot. Explore it a little too much.

And in some cases go too far, and forget even though God has the power to do absolutely anything, there are all sorts of things he can’t do. Not just “will not do,” not just “refuses to do,” not just “could do but won’t”—things he can’t do. Because to do such things violates the core of who he is. God is love, and can’t violate that attribute. Can not.

So is he almighty? Sure. So long that we remember “almighty” means God has the complete, unlimited power to do whatever he wants. If we’re only talking about complete, unlimited power to do anything at all, no. God’s never gonna be wicked. Period. It’s not who he is.

Those who love and covet God’s might, have a big problem with me making this “qualification.” Because they don’t wanna put any limits on God’s might. Even though God himself puts limits on his own might. He has way more self-control than we do. But those who covet power wanna claim, with no qualifications whatsoever, that God does have the complete, unlimited power to do anything at all—and we should be in awe of this raw power, and worship it.

Whoops, I mean God. And so do they. Kinda. But maybe not.

See, this is the inevitable problem with defining God by his might instead of his love: We humans have the bad habit of worshiping our favorite things about God, instead of God, the being, himself. We love to talk about God’s might ’cause we worship might. We love to talk about God’s unlimited resources, ’cause we worship wealth. I know this one music pastor who loves to talk about how God gets worshiped round his throne, ’cause he loves worship, and by “worship” this guy usually means music: He loves music. I won’t accuse him of worshiping music itself, but he does love music.

But when we worship God’s love… well, God is love. When we strive to define love the way the scriptures define love, and love God and our neighbor as commanded, we are by Jesus’s definition Mt 22.36-40 worshiping God. It’s not really misdirected worship. It’s correct worship. Worshiping might will quickly turn into idolatry; worshiping God’s love will always turn into worshiping God.

Read the whole thing! ➡️