TURKEY WILL USE PATIENCE TOWARDS ISRAELI KILLINGS

Erdogan: patience in face of "act of war"

This blog provides a meditation on the Episcopal daily readings along with a headline from world news:

1 Corinthians 1:1-19

1Paul, called to be an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and our brother Sosthenes,

2 To the church of God that is in Corinth, to those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, together with all those who in every place call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, both their Lord and ours:

3 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

4 I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that has been given you in Christ Jesus, 5for in every way you have been enriched in him, in speech and knowledge of every kind— 6just as the testimony of Christ has been strengthened among you— 7so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ. 8He will also strengthen you to the end, so that you may be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9God is faithful; by him you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

10 Now I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you should be in agreement and that there should be no divisions among you, but that you should be united in the same mind and the same purpose. 11For it has been reported to me by Chloe’s people that there are quarrels among you, my brothers and sisters. 12What I mean is that each of you says, ‘I belong to Paul’, or ‘I belong to Apollos’, or ‘I belong to Cephas’, or ‘I belong to Christ.’ 13Has Christ been divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul? 14I thank God that I baptized none of you except Crispus and Gaius, 15so that no one can say that you were baptized in my name. 16(I did baptize also the household of Stephanas; beyond that, I do not know whether I baptized anyone else.) 17For Christ did not send me to baptize but to proclaim the gospel, and not with eloquent wisdom, so that the cross of Christ might not be emptied of its power.

the opinions of the pundit: Limbaugh

18 For the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. 19For it is written,

‘I will destroy the wisdom of the wise,

and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.’

My judgement is that Paul is writing from Ephesus where he is imprisoned, perhaps in the Praesidium, awaiting trial on some matter, possibly the status of the religion he preaches. Judaism was a religio licita, an authorised religion, whereas Christianity, if separate from Judaism would not have been. Paul was especially clear that Christain faith was not a variety of Judaism, and might therefore have found himself with a problem. In Ephesus he receives a report about cliques in the Corinthian church, more especially perhaps about a group that looked down on mere believers because its members had knowledge which secured their salvation. Throughout his letter Paul is at pains to attack any sort of spiritual arrogance or sectarianism. All that sort of thing is for him mere religion and therefore dangerous to faith which is trust in God’s love through the cross of the Messiah. It would help if our translations of Paul’s letters used “Messiah” or “Anointed One” for the Greek Xristos, so that it’s always clear that Paul is speaking about the Crucified King. The wonder of God’s daftness revealed in the cross of his Messiah never ceases to amaze Paul and gives him a point from which he can laugh at the “wisdom of the wise and opinion of the pundit.” (v19). In a world of chattering pundits (and bloggers!) the foolishness of God remains a reliable guide.

 Matthew 4:1-11

4Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. 2He fasted for forty days and forty nights, and afterwards he was famished. 3The tempter came and said to him, ‘If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.’ 4But he answered, ‘It is written,

“One does not live by bread alone,

but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” ’

5 Then the devil took him to the holy city and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, 6saying to him, ‘If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down; for it is written,

“He will command his angels concerning you”,

and “On their hands they will bear you up,

so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.” ’

7Jesus said to him, ‘Again it is written, “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.” ’

8 Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendour; 9and he said to him, ‘All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.’ 10Jesus said to him, ‘Away with you, Satan! for it is written,

“Worship the Lord your God,

and serve only him.” ’

11Then the devil left him, and suddenly angels came and waited on him.

Jesus: not the caped crusader

Most commentators assume that Jesus could do the mighty acts the Devil encourages him to do. I assume the opposite: that he couldn’t and knew he couldn’t.

So, Satan says in effect. “If you are really God’s son (which of course you aren’t) you ought to be able to turn stones into bread and do a freefall spectacular from the top of the temple.” For Satan has understood the scandal of God’s Son-he’s human, not a superman. What is God thinking of? How daft can he be? Perhaps even the Son himself will find it difficult to trust such a plan, for how is he going to change the world if he has no power. This becomes explicit in the third temptation: if God has given him no powers, well, there’s someone who can….

In this wonderfully ironic story, Jesus reveals (the story must have come from Jesus) that he had to struggle with the temptations of popular politics and religion. He clearly rejects the role of superman. Jesus did not have a “son of God” implant which enabled him to do and think things beyond the power of human beings.

Throughout much of its history the church has preferred religion to Jesus, leaving the powerless Christ to be rediscovered again and again by powerless people of faith and of no faith.