In The Name Of ….

/ W. Keith Brenton / 16 Comments

And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. ~ Colossians 3:17

I’ve read a lot of writers in the fellowship of churches of Christ who insist that this verse means that (in the words of at least one of them): “Whatever we say and do must be supported by His authority” and “The church should obey the apostles’ teaching and should not adhere to anything not authorized by Christ.”

Which all sounds very scriptural and obedient and worthy, except that not everything that a church can do (even a lot of good things) can’t be said to be specifically authorized by Christ.

And a lot of things that churches — even churches led by some of these writers — are doing all the time are not specifically authorized.

I don’t really want to get into all that; it’s an old argument.

What I want to ask is: Where does the word “authority” fit into this verse? Which words is it between, so I can find it? Does this verse really have anything to do with the authority of Christ as a prerequisite for doing anything?

These writers’ logic goes like this: because a great many Old Testament verses and a few New Testament verses use the phrase “in the name of” to connote that someone spoke or acted “by the authority of,” that’s what it means here in Colossians 3; it can have no other meaning. (They’ll cite Deuteronomy 18; 1 Samuel 17:45; 2 Kings 2:24; Esther 8:10; Isaiah 48:1; Jeremiah 11:21; Acts 4:18; 16:18; James 5:14 and perhaps some others, and I won’t quibble.)

Trouble is, in the Old Testament and New, there are plenty of instances where “in the name of” has little or none of that connotation; it can mean “in behalf of” (1 Chronicles 16:2; 21:19; Psalm 129:8; Jeremiah 26:16; Matthew 21:9; Acts 5:40; 1 Corinthians 1:10) or “in honor of” (1 Samuel 20:42; 1 Kings 18:32; Psalm 20:5; Micah 4:5) or “trusting in / dependent upon” (Psalm 20:7; 124:8; Isaiah 50:10; Zephaniah 3:12; John 3:18; Acts 2:38; 10:48; 1 Corinthians 6:11; 1 John 3:23) or even “in gratitude to” (Psalm 106:47;  Ephesians 5:20)

The context of this verse is gratitude; giving thanks to God through Christ. Let’s just read a few verses which verse 17 culminates:

Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts. And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. ~ Colossians 3:15-17

Yes, the context is worship; specifically the sharing of gratitude to God with fellow believers in wisely teaching and edifying each other in song. It should be done in the name of the Lord Jesus.

How does that mean “with the authority of the Lord Jesus”? Is His authority needed in order to say “Thank you” to God? Is it a command to close each prayer “In Jesus’ Name” or God will not hear it? Was Jesus’ name required at the end of every prayer from Adam until the resurrection, too? Did the apostles all pray and sing and close each prayer and hymn “In Jesus’ Name” lest God not listen to them? Must we?

Is this a command to sing and sing only? Is this a command that specifically forbids instruments of music by not mentioning them at all?

Is this the only way that we are authorized to teach and admonish one another by vocal music? Should we have cantors rather than preachers?

Is there anywhere in this verse something that says everything a church or believer does must be specifically authorized by the authority of Jesus Christ and/or that anything not specifically authorized is automatically forbidden and condemned and punishable if violated by eternal hellfire (as some writers would have you believe)?

Does it only apply to gathered worship or also to individual worship?

Does it apply only to worship? (It does say “all.”)

I think there’s at least one alternative and better interpretation of the phrase “in the name of.”

I think this passage is a reminder that Jesus promised and explained:

And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it. ~ John 14:13-14; see also 15:16; 16:23-26

It is a custom that reminds both Jew and Gentile (who have been used to another way of praying and praising their God or gods) of the One through whom they have believed in a God who has accepted His last sacrifice for sin.

Surely we are to be as grateful to the Son as to the Father God; both made that sacrifice.

And let’s just think about the concept of worship for a moment. Is worship something that God wants from us because He has commanded it and requires it and expects us to only do it in prescribed ways with no margin for creativity and so we do it out of obligation, duty, fear and selfish desire to obey in order to be saved in heaven and avoid eternal punishment? Is that the motivation from which true worship springs?

Or does worship best flow from gratitude … from the joy of receiving the promise, of being blessed, of having worth ascribed to us by God and being entrusted with the precious gospel of Jesus Christ, to faithfully and truthfully bear it to others who need it as dearly as ourselves? Not to mention the power and promise that He will give what we ask (and doesn’t that imply a responsibility to know His will and to want it to be done and to ask for it to be done through us)?

Are we not to do all that we do in gratitude for what God through Christ has done for us?

The verse says what it says. Does it mean what these writers say it means? Is that the one and only meaning it can have — that “in the name of” means “by the authority of” and no other?

And if it can have both meanings in this passage … where in the context of the verse are the words that talk about authority?

Yes, I am using a different hermeneutic from most people, a Jesus Hermeneutic, that asks “Which interpretation draws me closer to God through Christ?” and the answer that it yields has nothing to do with the law Jesus fulfilled or instructions God left out but expects us to obey anyway.

And I will keep using it, because it points to the Way, the Truth and the Life and not to the law of sin and judgment and death.

Interpretation

/ W. Keith Brenton / 13 Comments

I just tweeted:

I hope I never reach the point where assumptions, opinions, and interpretations regarding scripture hold equal weight to scripture itself.

A Facebook friend asked, “Can you read a Bible verse without an interpretation? And how do you separate the scripture from the interpretation? Keith, I think I understand what you’re saying-that scripture takes precedence over opinion and I agree. I’m just not sure we can separate scripture from interpretation. Every time we read scripture we make an interpretation.”

I seem to read that a lot. Is it true?

Are we incapable of discerning the difference between what scripture says and what we (or others) think it says?

To me, Jesus seemed to be pretty tough on religious leaders who couldn’t; who added their own interpretation to scripture and made it weigh the same; as if it were God’s own doctrine rather than just based on God’s own doctrine.

When you go to a movie that’s “based on the best-selling biography” but, familiar as you are with that biography, encounter a point in the screenplay that takes wide liberties with the biography for the sake of dramatic effect, are you unable to discern that?

Why should it be different with scripture?

I answered my friend: “You don’t think there’s anyone who can come to a perplexing scripture and honestly say, ‘I don’t understand what this means’? That’s not an interpretation … It’s an admission.”

And if we are honestly unsure, isn’t discernment something that we can ask God for? That He gives through His Spirit?

I’m thinking 1 Kings 3:11 … Psalm 119:125 … 1 Corinthians 2:14 … Philippians 1:9-10.

Am I off-base with this interpretation?

Don’t you think God wants us to understand His word? Won’t He grant that if we ask? Is the problem that we don’t ask …?

“Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion? If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” ~ Luke 11:11-13

Or perhaps that we lean too much on our own understanding? (Proverbs 3:5; 18:2)

I’m not a heavily-structured logical thinker; I’ll just admit it. What logic I have is much more informal. But when I don’t understand a scripture, the first thing that I (usually remember to) do is ask for help. From God. From others. Because I believe there’s value in finding out what the consensus of others might be (if there is a consensus), or at least what the possibilities are.

Then I ask questions, and these are just a few of them — in addition to questions about the context/pericope, to whom it is written, when it is written, what its scope might be (just us, just them; both; then, now, both; etc.):

  • Is this the ONLY thing the scripture can mean here? Could it have more than one layer of meaning?
  • Is prophetic language or context in play?
  • Is it a commandment, instruction, request, narrative, parable, question, example, implication, poem/song/opera, historical record, what?
  • Has it been contravened by something in scripture that’s related and more recent/relevant?
  • Do other related scriptures confirm what it says or contradict it and why? For instance, were Jesus and party entering (Mark 10:46; Luke 18:35) or leaving (Matthew 20:29-34) Jericho when a blind man was/two blind men were healed? Or, as in that example, is it possible that two different things are described that are similar in some ways – one going in; two coming out?
  • Does it matter? (A value judgment: “A difference which makes no difference is no difference.” Not always true, but sometimes relevant.)
  • What’s the simplest explanation? (Occam’s Razor can often be helpful, though not determinative.)
  • What explanation points me to God through Jesus Christ? (This, of course, is the Jesus Hermeneutic. I didn’t invent it and I don’t think I named it. As far as I know it’s not trademarked or copyrighted and you should feel free to use it if it helps!)

Well, those are a few of mine. What are some of yours?

And should we believers be teaching responsible scripture reading, analysis and interpretation skills — as well as asking God for answers — a whole lot more?

Still Yet More Maxims of Methuselah Moot

/ W. Keith Brenton / Leave a comment

Methuselah MootRobert Heinlein chronicled a far-flung future’s The Notebooks of Lazarus Long; a few years later, David Gerrold responded with the often-hilarious and equally-irreverent Sayings of Solomon Short. That was all years ago, so I have decided at last to reveal Still Yet More Maxims of Methuselah Moot (although some of them go back as far as the Greek philosopher-humorist Eurippadese Eumendadese).

It is possibly coincidental that most if not all are 140 characters or less.

  • I’m so old I can still remember when a television was also a piece of furniture.
  • I don’t care whether you wish me a Merry Xmas, Christmas, Happy Holidays, Kwanzaa or Hanukkah. I love you and hope your season’s great!
  • Finished “The Shack” last night. Recalculating.
  • Have you noticed that in the advertising for all those iPads and tablets, nobody uses the positioning line “It’s like a big ol’ Palm Pilot”?
  • I’ve avoided entering the ministry thus far in life … mostly due to the fear of being changed from Free Moral Agent to Cheap Moral Agent.
  • Note to self: Don’t try to be too chummy with God today, okay? (Isaiah 55:8-9)
  • Can we really trust St. Nick? According to the commercials, he builds Mercedes-Benz … but he sells Chevrolets. #sleighworknotenough?
  • I kinda skipped the news over the holiday weekend … who’s the new GOP Presidential Flavor-Of-The-Week?
  • If I were a character in a J.K. Rowling “Harry Potter” novel, I’m afraid I would be named “Pudgewort.” #thanksgivingaftermath
  • I would like to shop on Cyber Monday, but I don’t want my computer to get pepper-sprayed or knocked unconscious by ‘Net police ….
  • Can I just honestly tell you I don’t know all the answers … partly because I’m not sure about all of the questions? No? Well, never mind.
  • This morning in class I’m substitute teaching on Mark 13 – the chapter where I once lost my faith (along with Matt. 24, Luke 9, 17 & 21).
  • No, no. It’s okay. Don’t mind me. Just go on with your posting. I’ve got a magazine.
  • I think the chief requirement for being a sports color commentator is a penchant for stating the obvious by using an obfuscating metaphor.
  • Bet that Aflac duck could be prepared for a more appropriate career by the chefs at P.F. Chang’s ….
  • Well, just hate me now. I kinda like Nickelback. And some other greasy shiftless rock bands that remind me of Black Oak Arkansas.
  • My first Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in hi-def. It’s like being there, but warmer.
  • All of you have something to be thankful for: that I was not cast in a “Twilight” movie, and you don’t have to see me without a shirt on.
  • I am thankful that I am not any more stupid than I am.
  • I know it’s a little early, but … anyone making plans for Festivus yet?
  • I’m really not hard to please at the Thanksgiving table …or any other table. I like anything with calories. The more calories, the better.
  • I hadn’t used the WinXP desktop in my office for about a month. I am now downloading & installing 123 high-priority updates. Est.: 1 hr. 22.
  • I wasn’t going to say anything, but our Christmas tree’s skirt makes its hips look big.
  • My dog has been worrying his black fur so much this week that it looks like a puppy exploded on the living room floor.
  • 140 characters in search of meaning and popularity. Used to be Twitter. Now it’s the Republican presidential candidate array.
  • Wish I could afford to Shop for Small Business this Saturday. I’d like to buy a hobby shop.
  • I think it’s a sign that I’ve watched too much TV recently when I wish the blonde lady from the Target commercials could get a life.
  • An iPhone is a great source of informational illumination … especially when in a windowless restroom and someone turns out the lights.
  • Matt. 7:20 says “By their fruits ye shall know them.” Dear Westboro Baptist Church: Maybe the Lord doesn’t need recycled horse apples.
  • Booing a first lady. Any first lady. Really classy. Suggest we change the name to CRASSCAR.
  • The current U.S. debt – $15 trillion – is that really more than $2,000 for every person alive on the planet or is my math messed up?
  • The more low-calorie soda you drink, the thinner you get … right?
  • If you have multiple personalities but keep them all straight, is it still a disorder? (We need to know urgently!)
  • The economic plight of our country is the direct result of a vast, both-wing conspiracy.
  • I am not ready for Thanksgiving. I am already 20 pounds overweight.
  • My mom was never shy about demonstrating to me why it is called “child-REARing.” #disciplinedwhethermyrankwascorporalornot
  • Grateful to have been able to get – and get over – my usual Sunday migraine yesterday and thrill to worship with my church family today!
  • If we want significant change, we need to start an Occupy A Restroom Stall movement. (Re: 1965 Natalie Wood movie “The Great Race”)
  • People who line up for midnight premieres of movies about teen vampires and werewolves are from the Twilight Zone.
  • When traveling by air and in airports, try to avoid critiquing things with the phrase “It’s da bomb.” #freeadviceworthwhatyoupaidforit
  • Dyslexia messes up your life. Here I’ve been trying to make a difference the last work day of the week, thinking they were “causal Fridays.”
  • Repeating myself wouldn’t be so bad if I just had something to say. Repeating myself wouldn’t be so bad if I just had something to say.
  • Someone going to the premiere please tell me tomorrrow what I so desperately need to know: 1. Who is Dawn? and 2. How did they break her?
  • Angi’s watching an HGTV International house search while I’m headed to bed. She was not impressed that I knew Buddha never lived in Budapest.
  • The problem, as I see it, is split three ways and two of them are difficult to focus upon. But that’s just because I have trifocals.
  • I’m trying to design my own custom emoticon. How’s this? 8^)> … Looks like I’m lying down on the job. Accurate enough.
  • I was never cool. I never cared about being cool until now, and I am too cool. Most of the time. I think a cardigan will take care of it.
  • It’s really hard for me to pray for Jerry Sandusky. I know I should. My compromise is to pray for him 1/18th as much as for his 18 victims.
  • Truth is usually the first victim of extremism.
  • Something you didn’t know (or remember or want to) about me: About 17 years ago, I had two pet newts, Rockne and Gingrich.
  • I think I’m at least as qualified to run as the top three GOP candidates Herman Cain, Rick Perry, and uh … and uh ….
  • Open my eyes, Lord, like you did for Elisha’s servant … to see Your armies surrounding me on the hills, ready to fight for my soul.
  • Today I am yearning for heaven, where news coverage does not have to be saturated with items about inappropriate sexual touching.
  • I just realized that, once again, I am dressed to depress.
  • Long night. Anyone in LR know of a medical supply where I can rent an intravenous caffeine drip? Open early?
  • What’s going on? Hogs having a good season. Cowboys having a good season. #Luck? #Fate? #Karma? #Apocalypse?
  • We need to have a national election to finally determine the only “There’s nothing worse than ….” #canonlybeone
  • Well, if it was “needless to say,” then why did you say it? #inarguable
  • Sorry. I am self-diagnosed with Twitrette Syndrome. It’s like Tourette; it just comes out of my keyboarding fingers instead of my mouth.
  • I’ve been making some really poor decisions lately. (As my terrible scores in Bejeweled 2 will confirm.)
  • Now that Veteran’s/Palindrome Day is over, did you know that if you take today’s date and divide by 12345, the result has no significance?
  • I think I could enjoy hunting in the deer woods if only I could afford a really nice camera with a really long lens. #nogunsthanks
  • … untangled his daughter’s charm necklace without invoking any foreign gods or extraneous dimensions. And with only ten fingers.
  • Little Chocolate Donuts: Breakfast of Champions. Sadly, on my plate are Little Sugar-And-Cinnamon Donuts: Breakfast of Runners-Up.
  • Five nights later, my body has still not adusted to the end of Daylight Saving Time. #goodnight
  • If you use the wrong fork first, no one is going to excommunicate you from the Fellowship of Formal Dining. And if they do, their loss.
  • Yes, Alaska and Hawaii have interstate highways. It is not the fault of the federal government if you and your car can’t make connections.
  • I just wanted to be the first to use the word “turducken” and mention how unappetizing it sounds, starting with those first four letters.
  • I’m a pacifist. I’m a Christian. I am unabashedly grateful for all veterans whose consciences prevent war from becoming worse.
  • The question of soteriology – how God saves us – is not multiple-choice but yes-no. And God’s answer is “YES!” in Jesus Christ.
  • Monsters often have trouble distinguishing attraction from hunger. #stuffivelearnedfromhorrorflicks
  • Monsters are not good about cleaning up after themselves. #stuffivelearnedfromhorrorflicks
  • Don’t go in old castles or Victorian houses after dark. The odds are against you. And the really-odds, too. #stuffivelearnedfromhorrorflicks
  • Zombies can be either superhumanly strong or very fragile. No way to tell by looking. #stuffivelearnedfromhorrorflicks
  • Monsters will always kill the sort-of cute girl in the tank top first. #stuffivelearnedfromhorrorflicks
  • Monsters also really like it when you back away from them and cover your mouth with the back of your hand. #stuffivelearnedfromhorrorflicks
  • If anyone, at any time, says anything about their laboratory, run away. #stuffivelearnedfromhorrorflicks
  • Monsters like it when you scream. They’ll do anything to to get you to scream. Anything. #stuffivelearnedfromhorrorflicks
  • Don’t go into dark spooky places by yourself and then scream to scare your friends. #stuffivelearnedfromhorrorflicks
  • There’s nothing wrong with being right. But there’s a wrong way to be right. And I know I’m right about this because I’m never wrong. Right?
  • What you don’t know can hurt you … even kill you. But probably not until it has tortured you first.
  • Wednesday is the day I usually update my church’s Web sites. Today, their server is down. And I’ve done about all the other stuff I can do.
  • If it’s my party’s candidate, it’s media persecution; if it’s the other party’s candidate, he’s guilty til proven innocent. #CainMeetClinton
  • Here’s my plan for today: Get through it. (Disclaimer: This plan may or may not succeed in your personal circumstances.)
  • Here are my words of wisdom for today: Stop doing stupid stuff. And let me know if it’s possible, will you?
  • I don’t believe I can accept Jesus as my personal Savior. He’s the Savior of all God’s family. Now about my so-called “personal banker” ….
  • May I tactfully point out the painfully obvious flaw in the logic of your dearly-cherished prejudice? No? Well, never mind then.
  • Seriously? An ice cream truck patrolling our neighborhood? In November? … Well, at least it’s blaring “Turkey in the Straw.”
  • I would like to comment on Cowboys/Seahawks, but pictures, descriptions or content used without the NFL’s permission is prohibited.
  • Nothing like starting the day with a migraine to remind you how blessed the previous 10 days have been without one.
  • Workmen tidying up after siding installation. Hosting formal dinner at 6:00. Can you say #beattheclock ?
  • #MaxLucado says, like David, we can either face the giant or flea. I choose the flea.
  • Thinking of starting an Anti-Defamation League for the One Percenters … and having a fundraiser. Poor abused things.
  • So far, the most interesting thing that has happened to me today is writing this tweet. I live such a wild and crazy life. Envy me.
  • I’m sorry, but all braincells are currently busy. Please hold your query until one is available. Thank you for your patience.
  • Given the choice of being taken prisoner by the Kardashians or the Cardassians, I’d choose the latter.
  • Criminy. I forgot the next apocalypse was October 23 (21?) and totally missed it. Anybody absent? Raptured? Hold up your hand if you were.
  • You’ll be glad to know I’m working on a new book. I thought I’d start with the binding.
  • I’m so old I can remember when Disney channel used KC’s “Get Down Tonight” and altered a line to “Do a little dance | make a little flub…”
  • Total depravity – embraced one way or another by Calvinism and Arminianism – sounds to me like an elaborate excuse for bad behavior.
  • I’m using my “Skip A Day” pass for Twitter today. What? It’s only good for Mitchum Deodorant? Well, forget it then. I’m posting this.
  • You know, the joy of worshiping God is either in your heart or it’s not … whether you like the song, the message, the leader — or not.
  • 17 million Americans are clinically depressed. I’m guessing they all watch the morning news.

It has been said that all of these are moot points, and I would find it difficult to disagree. However, if you would like to experience them as they spring unbidden to the three pounds of goat cheese known as my brain and thence to my keyboard, all you have to do is follow keith_brenton at Twitter.com.

The Verse Where I Once Lost My Faith

/ W. Keith Brenton / 6 Comments

“Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened.” ~ Jesus, Matthew 24:34 (also its parallels, Mark 13:30 and Luke 21:32. And don’t forget Luke 9:27.)

“This is certainly the most embarrassing verse in the Bible.” (Essay “The World’s Last Night” (1960), found in The Essential C.S. Lewis, p. 385)

It was a dark time in my life almost thirty years ago: my first marriage was failing and so was my faith.

Like Lewis — one of the most profound Christian thinkers I’ve yet encountered — I read what Jesus said about (as many Bible editors knowingly add as a subhead) “The Destruction of Jerusalem and Signs of the End Times.” And I reasoned that, since it had not happened in Jesus’ generation as He had predicted, He was wrong; and if He was wrong about that, He could have been wrong about a lot of things.

I had spent my due diligence time in the Harding University library (no Internet then) reading the theories and explanations: that “generation” might also mean “race;” that He might have been referring to the generation of the end times rather than the generation of Jerusalem’s destruction; that He wasn’t necessarily referring to the end times when He said “all these things” … and all the rest.

I read the systems that explained which verses referred to which parts of the prophecy; and which were already fulfilled and which were yet to come; and the reasons they were all jumbled up in Luke 9:21-27, 17:20-37 or chapter 21 but not its parallels Matthew 24 or Mark 13 where Jesus stuck to the system; and why perhaps He skipped about among them and …

None of them was persuasive.

None of them agreed with each other (possibly because there are no book deals to be made in agreeing with what is already published), and none of them was complete and none of them strictly adhered to both the scriptures and the rules of logic.

And for a time, I lost my faith. Like my first marriage, it simply ended. I had moved to another city and had no church home for a time, and for a shorter time I didn’t even attend church sporadically. Sunday became a day of rest and contemplation and recreation as it is for most of the not-believing (and quite a bit of the believing) world, and I liked it that way.

But my one-year assignment in that city came to its close, and I moved back. I missed my church family, and I went back home there, and I tried to forget the one-verse tripstone that had catapulted my faith and me heels-over-head-and-flat-on-my-fanny.

As the Internet became a part of my intentionally forgetful world, though, I one day stumbled across that quote by Lewis. And I crept back into the due-diligence mode, because … well, if you’ve read my self-description at this blog for the past seven/eight years, you already know … I am “someone who questions reality and won’t settle for an evasive answer.”

Rejecting virtually everything I had read and rejected before, I read and rejected just about everything else I could find — and for the same reasons.

And I just meditated on it. I had time. My marriage was — still is — flourishing wonderfully, and I felt no pressure nor desperation. There was plenty of other scripture to believe in even if I couldn’t accept this one, was my reasoning at the time. So I believed again. Mostly.

In time, as all of the authors/writers/thinkers I had read, I put together my own best guess.

And it goes like this:

What if there is no system, no separate prophecies, no skipping around? What if the subject Jesus spoke about in all of these situations (and through His Spirit, in many many other instances of scripture) was in fact one, just as He and the Father are one? Just as there is one Lord, one faith, one baptism … you get the picture.

What does it do to the prophecy if Jesus is speaking of the destruction of Jerusalem as The Day that He returns on the clouds/is revealed and judgment takes place and fire destroys and deliverance arrives but it is One Very Long The Day? What if — just as each sin we commit is connected with the sin of Adam and Eve and the salvation we receive when accepting Christ is connected with the cross and the tomb — what if the moment of each individual death is also connected with the moment of His return and revelation (and also in a temporally-inexplicable way)? What if He began coming in His kingdom then and still comes when each believer dies and along with his angels gathers His elect from the four corners of the earth, taking one and leaving the one next to him or her behind? What if it is not so much an event in this world, but in the nearby world of eternity that Stephen saw before the first stone flew at him? What if it’s not so much an event at all, but a process?

In my reasoning, this theory does nothing in contradiction to the prophecy.

But, you see, that is my theory’s greatest flaw and weakness: in my reasoning.

Reasoning got me into a loss of faith and I doubt very much that reasoning is going to bring anyone’s faith fully back because I don’t know. You don’t know. Nobody knows exactly what it means.

Nobody knows exactly how or when the world ends, or even for sure what that means. Even Jesus didn’t, when He still held a mortal form and breathed the air of this world and loved life in it and dedicated Himself to living it and losing it and receiving it back from the Father so that the rest of us could, too.

Now, you can hang your hat on that truth. Anyone can understand it. Anyone can — and should — bet his or her life on it. It is simple and true. But while everything Jesus said was true, not all of it was simple.

And not one of the authors I read — Lewis included — had what it took to just say, “I don’t know.” Instead, they reasoned. Then gave their reasoning the weight of scripture.

It’s painfully ironic to me that C.S. Lewis — who wrote his children’s novels of Narnia, a world where time passed at a different rate than here on earth — could not grasp the possibility that eternity’s The Day might pass at a different rate than a day on earth. Surely he did not forget the paradox stated by Peter:

“But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. ” ~ 2 Peter 3:8

Peter’s talking about the Lord’s return here. You can tell by the subhead that many Bible editors knowingly put over the paragraph: “The Day of the Lord.”

So Lewis made an assumption, that “this generation” meant “this generation” and that was it; it could not mean anything else. It was to be a single-day event, taken or left behind: clouds are clouds, days are days, stars are stars, the sun is the sun, the moon is the moon, trumpets are trumpets. All of that in spite of hundreds of years of prophetic language (and the Revelation to John yet-to-come) where virtually nothing is literal.

And he could not see the possibility of my theory.

Which gives me comfort, because it helps me see possibilities. But what if I’m wrong.

I probably am. I pretty much expect to be.

I don’t know.

Here’s what I do know, and here’s what I’ve learned: Belief is not contingent upon full comprehension.

Some things God shows and some things God hints at and some things God hides for another day.

So believe anyway.

It won’t do you any good to stand defiantly right where He can see you and demand to know all of His secrets while standing on one foot before you are willing to believe. Trust me on this.

Been there. Done that.

Well, now you know what I’ve learned, and about the verse where I once lost my faith, and the reason why my blog is titled “Blog in My Own Eye” and about the absolutely arrogant idiocy that’s involved in thinking that you know enough to judge God based on your own understanding.

Just be willing to say, as I will now say for the third time: “I don’t know.

“Yet I believe.

“Lord, help my unbelief.”

He just might, you know.

He did for me.

Keith Brenton: Ultra-Conservative

/ W. Keith Brenton / 16 Comments

Methuselah MootIs that possible?

Well, probably not in terms of politics, but with regard to Christianity … yes, I think it might be.

You see — as I’ve shared before — I think there are a lot more things expressed by the Lord in imperative tones than just five or six “steps” and BING! you’re “saved.”

And I believe that everything the Lord asks of us, whether you want to call them commands or not, are necessary because He knows they are good for us, will bless us, will help us to grow spiritually and to grow closer to Him and to others.

Yet the preaching within too much of Christianity is centered — not on Christ who saves us — but on what we must and must not do (as long as it’s not more than five or six “steps”) in order to be “saved.”

And I put “steps” in quotes because you won’t find the concept of “steps to salvation” in scripture.

And I put “saved” in quotes because you won’t find many preachers willing to share with you a comprehensive definition of what it means to be “saved.”

Eternal life in heaven with God and a get-out-of-hell-free card, sure. I get that. Most people do. Is that all? Sure, it’s enough, but is it all? What does it mean to be “saved” in this life?

That, I believe, is at least as much of what Jesus’ teachings and example were concerned with as pie-in-the-sky-by-and-by.

Yet when was the last time you heard or read (or perhaps gave) a sermon on the imperative expressed in Luke 12:33? Is that not a salvific concept? Is it not a salvation “issue”? Or is it just about whether your bank account will take you through eternity when you get to heaven?

When was the last time you encountered teaching on Matthew 5:16? Why does 27-32 get a lot of press but 38-48 gets virtually none?

Why do we ignore 6:16-18 entirely? Did Jesus not say those words? Are they not in imperative mood? Do they not presuppose that we will elect to fast?

Is there any one of those things that God asks of us that doesn’t testify to (and live out before others around us) His goodness, His grace, His power to save, His willingness to do so, His love for us, His very own Son’s life?

I could rattle off another dozen, and they wouldn’t add to the value of the discussion because I’m betting you could too. Let me just cut to the chase:

We don’t preach those things because they’re our shortcomings and oversights and, yes, sins of omission — and if they were preached about with the same ferocity and intensity that marriage, divorce and remarriage or salvational step-jumping is preached then someone would get fired for infringing on our consciences instead of preaching hellfire and damnation against someone else’s sins.

There. I’ve said it. And I ain’t a-takin’ ‘er back.

So you just call me liberal all you want to. You’re wrong. I’ll bet I am at least as conservative about what Jesus said needs doing and what God wants for us to do as anyone else you know. Probably more.

It’s what man says about what scripture says that I have my doubts about.

‘Cause it’s not like scripture doesn’t say enough already to convict and still save every single daggum one of us.

Something Big and Sinister

/ W. Keith Brenton / 3 Comments

Arthur Dent: “All my life I’ve had this strange feeling that there’s something big and sinister going on in the world.”
Slartibartfast: “No, that’s perfectly normal paranoia. Everyone in the universe gets that.”

~ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

I believe the mythical designer of terran fjords and fiddly-bits is mistaken.

There is something big and sinister going on in the world, and I think we all feel it. And we can let it lead us into paranoia and madness-that’s-even-worse and eventually total destruction. Or not.

It’s sin, plain and simple. And if you’ve read very much stuff I’ve written, you know that I believe sinleadstodeath sinleadstodeath sinleadstodeath.

And death is possibly the second-most pointless and absurd and frustrating thing ever, yet absolutely necessary because sin and self cannot be permitted to endure forever and ruin the ongoing effort to bring things back to the way they really ought to be.

Look around. Look at this world. It’s a perfectly gorgeous place on the whole.

Now.

Read a newspaper. Or if you’re not haply or happily literate and reading this anyway, watch a news broadcast on the telly. This world’s a mess. It’s not getting any better.

And it’s all because people make decisions largely or solely based on self-interest, then act on them. Casually, brutally, thoughtlessly — whatever. We act on whatever we want or want to happen.

Sin, in other words.

With no particular preperception or concern regarding the consequences, particularly for others.

Sin.

The single most pointless and absurd and frustrating thing in the world.

Sin has completely screwed up our planet.

And the Person who actually created it (no, it was not Slartibartfast) did not have sin in His intentions for us. It was not what He wants for us. It never was. It separated us from Him and from all the good and great things this planet could have been and that we could have been and might yet be.

Nevertheless He has a plan to restore all that, but it is more horrifically expensive than any custom-made planet built by the Magrathean WorldWerks, or whatever it was Adams called it.

The plan cost God heaven’s dearest blood, His own Son, tortured and slaughtered at the hands of man’s sin — but brought back to life by a love that simply cannot be obliterated, bought, sold, perverted, or turned only on one’s self.

And to me, the fact that there is something big and sinister and wrong in this world is the greatest evidence that there is something — someOne — far bigger and selfless and right beyond it; and He loves without limit and He wants to make things good and right and perfect again.

The way things ought to be.

Thankless Thanksgiving

/ W. Keith Brenton / 1 Comment

An atheist’s life must be trying indeed
with no end of strife and yet no faith to plead

with moral compunctions that have no real source
and choices at junctions but no certain course

surrounded with beauty and no One to praise
no feeling of duty, no paean to raise

awash in abundance yet no One to thank
swayed by the influence that God is a prank

tempted to be hateful or angry or vexed
still moved to be grateful yet somehow perplexed

on thankless Thanksgiving, the atheist’s need
– forgive my forgiving – must be trying indeed.

Yet More Maxims of Methuselah Moot

/ W. Keith Brenton / Leave a comment

Methuselah MootRobert Heinlein chronicled a far-flung future’s The Notebooks of Lazarus Long; a few years later, David Gerrold responded with the often-hilarious and equally-irreverent Sayings of Solomon Short. That was all years ago, so I have decided at last to reveal Yet More Maxims of Methuselah Moot (although some of them go back as far as the Roman philosopher-humorist Locquacius Rudimentus).

It is merely coincidental that most if not all are 140 characters or less.

  • Now watching the original Disney “Fantasia” – a long-time Halloween tradition. “Night on Bald Mountain” fading into “Ave Maria.” Awesome.
  • I’ve been watching AMC’s 2009 re-visioning of the 1966 Brit series “The Prisoner.” Nothing is more scary than being unable to discern truth.
  • #thatawkwardmoment when rolling a pumpkin downhill on the street is not the harmless prank you thought as it bowls over two toddler fairies.
  • #thatawkwardmoment when you realize that the two folks in police costumes at the door are there about the party noise, not to accept Neccos.
  • #thatawkwardmoment when you compliment a mom with kids at your door with “Nice witch costume!” and she growls back: “What costume?”
  • #thatawkwardmoment when you run out of Halloween candy in the middle of a group of costumed teens, any of whom is big enough to take you.
  • #thatawkwardmoment when you tap someone on the shoulder who is paused at the wrought-iron fence reading the “Beware of the Thing” sign.
  • #thatawkwardmoment when the door’s answered by a lady in a scant dominatrix costume telling your kids, “You wanna treat? Roll over and beg.”
  • Somebody tell me again how dressing up to look like someone we’re not and demanding treats on Halloween is different from any other day…?
  • #thatawkwardmoment in the back of the squad car when you realize an orange jumpsuit was not your best choice as a Halloween costume.
  • #thatawkwardmoment when you told her it was the most terrifying Halloween wig you’d ever seen and she said it was her new $70 do.
  • #thatawkwardmoment when you really outdid yourself on your Halloween costume and you showed up the only one costumed.
  • #thatawkwardmoment when you try to return your Halloween costume on November 1 … even though you have a receipt.
  • #thatawkwardmoment when your cup of fogging Halloween brew turns out to have a chip of dry ice in it that freezes your lips together.
  • #thatawkwardmoment after you put on your Halloween costume and someone asks you “Why didn’t you wear a costume?”
  • Anyone who plays God should be prepared to lose. It’s not that He cheats ; He just holds all the cards.
  • #thatawkwardmoment when you’re all hyped for Halloween, watching the Charlie Brown cartoon, and pass out when the Great Pumpkin rises.
  • #thatawkwardmoment when you’re chatting about horror flicks and can’t remember Michael Myers from Jason Voorhees. Or their last names.
  • #thatawkwardmoment at the Halloween bash when you realize none of these young kids know what a Klingon is – and they’re in their 20s & 30s.
  • #thatawkwardmoment when you’ve told your mom you want to be a hobo for Halloween; she rolls you up in a brown rug because she heard “HoHo.”
  • If you gave me a gift, how would you feel if I said, “Oh, I really want and need this. But I can’t. Could I just work for you and earn it?”
  • Pugsley had a solution to the problem of both protestors and Wall Street … if he could just get the trajectory right.
  • Wednesday was sure that there was a person inside the big purple dinosaur, but could be surgically removed without either one surviving.
  • By the end of the episode, neither Elvira nor Morticia could be persuaded to “Say Yes to the Dress.”
  • Many dining establishments are now serving food with sea salt, where the word “sea” is a synonym for “way too much.”
  • You couldn’t pay me enough to be President. Wouldn’t do it. Not for all the money we owe China.
  • Trying Dunkin Donuts’ Pumpkin Spice coffee, the home brew version, this morning. Liking it. Liking it very much.
  • Now everyone will start noticing there’s no basketball. I like basketball. I liked it a lot more when it was a game rather than an industry.
  • McRib … probably the scariest thing about Halloween.
  • Say you went shopping for a religion. Would you be more impressed by those who were smart about their faith – or those who lived it well?
  • You know, when they create a tv series called “CSI Cleveland,” it’s time to euthanize the franchise.
  • Are there still teams playing baseball? For cryin’ out loud, it’s nearly November! Are they waiting for snow to stop them?
  • The Aflac duck has looked delicious to me for some time … but I’ve come to favor shooting the Major Medical pigeon on general principles.
  • Or possibly so that they will conclude I am not loaded yet, but would like to be.
  • I’ve decided that I want my personal logo to be an animated spinning spokewheel … so people will get impatient with me and give up on me.
  • Whenever Buddhism starts sounding attractive to me, I just assume a lotus position and try not to think about it.
  • I’m awake. I’m up. I can’t say I’m real happy about it.
  • I think it’s hysterical when you run Windows Update and click to restart and get a message: “Can’t shut down. Windows Update still running.”
  • I apologize for my previous (and incomplete) tweet; there is really no excuse or justification for my inexplicable lack of planning and fore
  • I must truly and deeply express my regret that the final part of this tweet will not be able to appear due to the inordinate amount of chara
  • But I’m not lost! I’m exploring. And enjoying the scenery. (So chill out, willya?)
  • “I’m not sure I agree with you.” (Actually, I’m pretty sure you’re dead wrong, but this sounds nicer.) #whatwesay #whatwemean
  • Henry David Thoreau said most men lead lives of quiet desperation. The Apostle Paul recommended a life of quiet inspiration (1 Ths. 4:9-12).
  • I love a bowl of McCann’s Irish Oatmeal with a dollop of apricot preserves on top. But tonight, it’s blackberry. Just as good.
  • Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana. Pop flies don’t like an outfielder. #worldserieshumor
  • I believe that all of my prayers are answered – perhaps not the way (or as soon as) I would like/expect – but always answered.
  • Pretend that Christ comes to your church this morning. Nobody talks about Him. Nobody sings about Him. Would He feel welcome?
  • Pretend you have never stepped into your church before. You don’t know anyone. You don’t know what’s going on. Would you feel welcome?
  • Beware the candidate who promises lower taxes and less government but has been happy to accept a paycheck as governor or congressman.
  • When his assistant told him she would kill for a promotion like his, he didn’t take her literally. #grimtweets
  • On the other hand, he should have known better to buy a designer necktie made of hemp by an outfit named Neuse. #grimtweets
  • “You would think that, among so many thousands of them – more or less – that one nuclear warhead wouldn’t matter,” he reasoned. #grimtweets
  • Henbane or hemlock? She stroked her pointed chin, not remembering. In the end, it probably didn’t matter. In the end. #grimtweets
  • The Antarctic outpost was exactly like the way he had seen it in his premonitional dream … except for one Thing …. #grimtweets
  • Standing outside it, Ted wondered why anyone would go in it. He didn’t know that outside or in didn’t matter to this house. #grimtweets
  • Skipping over the grave’s freshly-turned dirt, the last thing Sally expected was to feel her ankle grabbed. The very last thing. #grimtweets
  • Encased in a huge block of transparent Lucite, the gorgeous young woman looked very lifelike. Especially when she blinked. #grimtweets
  • “It’s midnight,” they urged the mysterious ball guest. “Won’t you take off that ugly Death mask?” “What mask?” #grimtweets @mike_the_eyeguy
  • Racing his motor, Dean estimated whether the old lady in front of him would get a cross. She did; a white one. #grimtweets @mike_the_eyeguy
  • “I’m not sure I’m ready for that kind of commitment.” – Dr. Victor Friese, en route to Arkham Asylum. #grimtweets @mike_the_eyeguy
  • “As it turns out, the way to a man’s heart CAN be his stomach.” – Sadie “The Surgeon” Stitcher #grimtweets @mike_the_eyeguy
  • “In retrospect, it was not a priority that foredeck passengers have fresh ice.” Capt. Edward Smith, RMS Titanic #grimtweets @mike_the_eyeguy
  • Any idiot can rail against something. (I’ve proven this by example.) But it takes a lot more courage to stand FOR something … or Someone.
  • Toughest marching orders ever: “This is my commandment, that ye love one another, even as I have loved you.” – John 15:12
  • What is so difficult about Matthew 24:36 and 25:13 for Harold Camping to understand? “You do not know the day or hour….”
  • My cat and dog always get a handout as Angi makes a turkey sandwich for my son’s lunch. He doesn’t have class on Friday. They’re devastated.
  • It doesn’t take an advanced degree in biblical studies to see that what the Bible is talking about is loving God and others more than self.
  • I don’t want to be known as the guy who put the “mental” in “judgmental.”
  • Is it possible? That I will never again have to worry about how to spell Khadaffi / Qadaffi / Ghaddafy?
  • I never got a do-over on that last tweet and now this one’s turning out to be just as pointless.
  • I would like a do-over on this tweet because I didn’t get it right the first time.
  • It would seem that, for me, every glass is a dribble glass.
  • Romney and Perry last night: What Aunt Eller said about Curly and Judd Fry out in the smokehouse.
  • I am a little bit slysdexic.
  • Here is the task, as I see it, faced in preaching… “Churches of Christ and the Challenge of Preaching” goo.gl/47N9U
  • Rain awakens. First thought: You know what made David a man after God’s own heart? He forgave Saul over and over. Just like God forgives.
  • I can’t take seriously anyone who proclaims that they KNOW a certain person is condemned to hell. God gave them a peek at Judgment Day …?
  • God was at work in many churches yesterday. He’s also at work in many homes and workplaces today.
  • You can flail away at the straw man all you want, but as soon as you put a name and face on it, you appear mean-spirited AND stupid.
  • God was at work in many churches today. (But you can still reach Him at home.)
  • I was thinking of creating an event on Facebook and Twitter called “Occupy Time Better.” But I’d have to give up Facebook and Twitter.
  • Two of the most vanishingly uncommon commodities of the 21st century are common sense and common courtesy.
  • Angi and I decided our kids and pets would know they are not the center of our lives. The kids know it’s Christ. The pets are a challenge.
  • Third cable outage of the day. I think there should be legislation permitting customers to pro-rate their bills, deducting offline time.
  • How about making tax breaks available only to companies whose best-paid employee’s total comp. package exceeds the least by 100x or less?
  • Too often we assume that when two theories are oppositional, one must be right and the other wrong. They could BOTH be wrong.
  • I don’t believe God has to obey Bishop Ussher or Charles Darwin when it comes to the way and duration of His creative process.
  • “I was technophobic before technophobia was cool.” – the last known tweet* of Henry David Thoreau (*disputed, due to pre-Y2K servers)
  • My theory is that the zombie myth got started when someone saw a person like me getting out of bed before coffee was invented.
  • Not sure about my Mac. It just installed 3 updates, displaying a “Cleaning up…” message for a long time. But my office is still dirty.
  • Friends come and go. Power is fleeting. Wealth may desert you. I just want cookies.
  • Forgive my Restoration roots, but where’s the book, chapter and verse in the Koran that authorizes blowing up people with your underwear?
  • Does it astound you that the Creator of the universe, almighty God, everlasting Father, hears your prayer and seeks you as child and friend?
  • “Plain burger. Just a patty and bun.” WHAT IS SO HARD TO UNDERSTAND ABOUT THAT? #BKdrivethruworkersatmentalvmax
  • Passed too many one-handed drivers on cellphones in rain today. Good news for body shops, hospitals and mortuaries. Not so much for others.
  • There should be no /s in the body, but its parts should have = concern for each other. – 1 Cor 12:25 #biblemath
  • Faith + goodness + knowledge + self-control + perseverance + godliness + brotherly kindness + love. – 2 Peter 1:5-7 #biblemath
  • (Christ) was sacrificed x 1 to – the (sins) of many people. – Hebrews 9:28 #biblemath
  • The one who is in you is > the one who is in the world. – 1 John 4:4 // God is > our hearts. – 1 John 3:20 #biblemath
  • Two passages that give me pause when I think that someone seeking benevolence is actually scamming: 1 Corinthians 6:7 and Matthew 5:40-42.
  • So the Senate rejected the jobs bill. You know, firing these 100 people might actually improve unemployment.
  • I wonder if the murderous interplanetary spree of Redjack started when H.G. Wells dispersed him from the time machine in 1979 San Francisco?
  • Ever been sent a friend request by Facebook User? I’ve seen some of the comments made by Facebook User, and I’m not eager to accept.
  • Sure it’ll do 88 in a mall parking lot, fly in a thunderstorm and travel through time. But can you still get parts for it?
  • Forcryinoutloud does she have to smack her lips and romp on the bed all night? (The cat, that is. Angi’s out of town.)
  • I have restless, questing mind. I wonder things … like, “Did Morticia Addams knit scarves for Dr. Who when Cousin Crimp had enough?”
  • Could you tell the voices inside your head to speak more softly? The voices inside my head can’t hear each other. Thanks.
  • Had something witty and sweet to tweet, but by the time I remembered what it was, it wasn’t all that witty or sweet. So this is all you get.
  • Daughter @lauralbren has written her favorite verses in dry-erase on her mirror. Each day she gets ready and sees herself reflected in them.
  • I just can’t seem to follow the thread of this discussion. Oh, wait; this is #Twitter.
  • There is objective truth … and there is subjective interpretation. When we cannot tell the difference between them, we’re deceived.
  • Don’t mean to state the obvious, but when you post something everyone already knows is true, you’re stating the obvious. #obviously
  • I wish @TravelingMead would write books. I wish he had a publisher named Wensch, whom I could call and implore “More Mead, Wensch!”
  • If Christianity is only about living a Christ-like life to the glory of God, how can that be the same as anything else?
  • If Christianity is only about helping those in need, how is that different from a registered charity?
  • If Christianity is only about evangelism and saving people to save other people, how is that different from a pyramid scheme?
  • Think I’ll bill Bank of America $5 a month for insulting my intelligence and favoring stockholders over customers. They’re not even my bank.
  • I am a geek. I am enjoying “Pirates of Silicon Valley” on #TNT.
  • I’m not sure Steve Jobs was successful as a Buddhist. How could so many incredible somethings come from a mind full of emptiness?
  • Steve Jobs is dead. I am saddened. I feel the way I felt in fourth grade when I heard that Walt Disney had died. Now innovation is up to us.
  • What do we learn from Gog and Magog (Rev. 20)? Trust God to bring the fire.
  • What do we learn from Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 2-5)? Trust God to bring the fire. Don’t let it go out. Don’t try to bring your own.
  • What do we learn from Nadab and Abihu (Lev. 9:24-10:2)? Trust God to bring the fire. Don’t let it go out. Don’t try to bring your own.
  • Can you be happy and not know it? And is it okay to clap your hands anyway?
  • Went home sick but still working a little. Took decongestant and a big steamy bowl of cafe au lait.
  • I don’t feel good and I have all of the personal charm of a pit viper. This is after coffee. Not good.
  • Surprised that Spain doesn’t build hi-mileage cars. When they built sailing ships, they’d get 20-30,000 miles per galleon. #oldjokerecycled
  • My education: Currently pursuing a course in Life Studies at the University of Soft Knocks (Matt. 7:7; Luke 11:9; Rev. 3:20).
  • How can I expect a fantasy football team to win when they won’t do their two-a-days, dress out or even run laps? #troubledfantasy
  • I’m so grateful for what I have – but sometimes I look at Angi and wish we could have met 15 years earlier and shared those years, too.
  • What would it take to persuade you that you have more value than you know? What if I told you God loves you so much that Jesus died for you?
  • What would it take to persuade you that you have more value than you know? A haunting from Christmas Spirits Past, Present, and Future?
  • What would it take to persuade you that you have more value than you know? A visit from Clarence Oddbody?
  • I should not be this excited that Discovery’s HD Theater channel is becoming the all-car channel Velocity. But I am.
  • When my back and knees hurt, I prefer to think of my peculiar gait as performance art. #ministeroffunnywalks
  • Where does your cosmology come from: “Big Bang Theory” or “Third Rock from the Sun”?
  • My sense of humor has finally graduated from sophomoric to junioric. (Though some might say this post contradicts that.)
  • Running really is for people being chased down as food or chasing down food.

It has been said that all of these are moot points, and I would find it difficult to disagree. However, if you would like to experience them as they spring unbidden to my semi-consciousness and thence to my keyboard, all you have to do is follow keith_brenton at Twitter.com.

Everything is Possible for You

/ W. Keith Brenton / 4 Comments

Going a little farther, he fell to the ground and prayed that if possible the hour might pass from him. “Abba, Father,” he said, “everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.” ~ Mark 14:35-36

I had a trying moment Sunday morning during the observance of the Lord’s Supper with my church family. I read that verse and came pretty close to losing all composure. I wasn’t certain I could stay at the sound board anymore, or that I could do what I needed to do there.

Read it again with me, as I did then:

“Everything is possible for You.”

I have never known Jesus to be wrong or mistaken about anything. If He believed something to be true, it was true. He believed it was possible for the hour to pass from Him, because everything was possible for God.

It’s just five words in the English language, and only Mark’s gospel includes them.

That’s not to say that Jesus never said the same thing in other contexts; He did. Like Mark 10:27. And Luke 18:27. Once He even told a desperate man with a tortured child, “Everything is possible for one who believes.” (Mark 9:23)

Yet the context in Gethsemane is the fate of the world and it is bearing right down on His weary shoulders and He is God’s Son and God can do anything.

He could accept a lesser sacrifice … just as He had done with Abraham. (Genesis 22) It didn’t have to be His Son, His only Son, arrested and pummeled and run all over town and tried and mocked and spat upon and whipped within an inch of His life and crucified six hours to take that last inch.

It was possible.

All Jesus had to do was say the word and twelve legions of angels would have appeared to rescue Him.

But the word He said instead was, “Yet…”

Both Father and Son knew that He had to submit to this final act of obedience. The prophecies could not be unwritten. The destiny could not be transferred. The Story had to be lived out; fulfilled to the fullest … for it would be the Story that would win millions back to God.

Do you think Jesus struggled with questions of theodicy in Gethsemane? Do you think He took them personally?

He did, you know. All the way to the cross … and the tomb … and glory.

The writer of Hebrews 5:8 says He learned obedience through what He suffered. The hard way. The hardest way. He obeyed fully, because we could not.

So I beg you to deal with that now, right now, and don’t put it off until you’re struggling with theodicy or dealing with something you feel is unfair in your life or carrying a burden you feel God has given you that is too much to bear. Or even when you’re running a sound board during a worship service with your church family.

Everything is possible with God.

Everything is possible for those who believe.

Including surviving six hours on a cross when nearly bled to death.

And forgiving the thief next to you and the traitor who turned you in and all of humanity for standing around while you perish yet doing nothing.

And living again, a glorious life, renewed and redeemed and beloved by God in His home with His family, forever and ever and ever.

If it can be done with His Son, it can be done with you and me.

It’s God’s will for us.

Anything that’s His will, He makes it possible.

More Maxims of Methuselah Moot

/ W. Keith Brenton / 1 Comment

Methuselah MootRobert Heinlein chronicled a far-flung future’s The Notebooks of Lazarus Long; a few years later, David Gerrold responded with the often-hilarious and equally-irreverent Sayings of Solomon Short. That was all years ago, so I have decided at last to reveal More Maxims of Methuselah Moot (although some of them go back as far as the Greek philosopher-humorist Idontwantnunades).

It is merely coincidental that most if not all are 140 characters or less.

  • I always like getting the last word. Tonight I thought I’d be generous and share it: zyzzyva. You’re welcome.
  • Because of the prior claim staked by the public relations field on the initials “P.R.,” political rhetoric may now be abbreviated “B.S.”
  • Is the sudden surge of sea salt-seasoned foods threatening the salinity of oceans & all life in them? I think #theonion should investigate.
  • #quickbio Carrie Nation: a healthy-sized 19th-20th Century gal who got really hacked off about alcohol abuse.
  • I don’t want to want stuff but I want stuff more than I want to not want stuff so I have more stuff than I want but I want even more stuff.
  • I admire the spunk of all you folks Meeting at the Pole this morning. But it’s, like, 4000 miles to the Pole and I’ve got to get to work.
  • I want a “Life is Good” t-shirt. But I want it to say, “Life is Pretty Good. Afterlife is Better.”
  • You have an American, God-given right to be as afraid as you want to be. But perfect love beats fear every time.
  • For some reason, the song that won’t leave my head today is “Amazing Grace” … to the tune of “House of the Rising Sun.” And I like it.
  • I think it’s getting easier for me to see others as people Jesus died for. Until they get behind the wheel of a car. Still working on that.
  • I’m watching educational TV (AFV). I learned: If it involves a ramp & bike, ladder, tree & chainsaw, or panel-side pool … don’t do it.
  • I don’t want to brag, but social networking online was originally my idea. It’s just that ElbowBook never took off. #soclose
  • Just in: NASA Launches Fall Season With Falling Satellite / Hopes to Reach One In 3,800 With Personal Reminder
  • Aw, heck, CERN; I’ve received neutrinos the past few years that I haven’t even fired from my accelerator yet. That’s just neutrinos for ya.
  • Working on my aluminum foil skullcap for tomorrow – protection from the falling satellite and the invasion of telepathic aliens after. #2fer
  • I’d like advance warning when it’s “Turn Left in Front of Oncoming Traffic Day.” (Three times on the way to work.)
  • Cannibalism in the Bible: “If you keep on biting and devouring each other, watch out or you will be destroyed by each other.” – Gal. 5:15
  • Do I become irrelevant if I confess that Facebook’s changes don’t matter to me at all? Or was I already irrelevant?
  • If I quit Twitter, Facebook, and Google+ … would I even miss me? Schizophrenic minds want to know.
  • Looking forward to being merged with a falling NASA satellite Friday like the hapless Rick from “Northern Exposure.”
  • To divide the church is to deny reality; Christ prayed/gave His Spirit to make us one. We need only maintain that reality, bonded in peace.
  • It was on a tree in Eden that death hung disguised as the fruit of knowledge, and on a crosstree of death that Life bore the fruit of love.
  • Not sure I’m up for today. Let me check. Yeah, I’m out of bed and standing. I guess I am up for today.
  • Grace and obedience are opposite sides of the same coin. We obey out of gratitude for grace. We show grace to others by obedience.
  • “Oh, I’ve got the wrong number.” “That’s okay. I always slept through the numbers part of ‘Sesame Street,’ too.”
  • “Oh, I’ve called the wrong person.” “No, I’m always right. If you’re looking for the wrong person, let me connect you to my ex.”
  • “Oh, I’ve got the wrong number.” “Well, maybe, but I wouldn’t attach too much moral significance to a string of numerals.”
  • “Oh, I’ve called the wrong number.” “Well, if you knew it was the wrong number, why did you call it?”
  • “Oh, I must have the wrong number.” “Well, if it’s something you must have, this is certainly the wrong number.”
  • Thomas Edison’s actual words on the first telephone call: “What’s up? Comb hair. I need jute.” #crazyoldguy #poorsoundquality
  • Pondering John the Baptist. Think about it: if you wore camel’s hair and ate bugs you’d probably be alone out crying in the wilderness, too.
  • Hats off to worldwise little ones who want to wear rubber boots even when it’s not raining. You never know when you might step in something.
  • Some minister friends defend their shaved heads: “Try it; you’ll never go back.” But I don’t buy that “once-shaved, always-shaved” stuff.
  • I shot a 44 on the first nine holes, but the golf course folks shooed me away and said next time I should bring clubs and balls, not a gun.
  • The way people bring us their extra snack food at the church office, you’d think we were all starving and indigent. #nothardly
  • I was an odd child. Which is totally unfair; it should have been my older and younger sisters who were odd. They were born first and third.
  • I should have my own HGTV show: “How To Do All Those Things Around The House That You’ll Never Do Because You’re Too Busy Watching HGTV.”
  • A useful phrase for parents of pre-teens: “How many ways would like to hear me say ‘no’?”
  • It may not be a scripturally-sustainable philosophy, but if the world could end at any moment, why not go ahead and have the cheese dip?
  • This is my favorite time of day: when I am feeling so overwhemed that I just sit back, relax, and pretend that I don’t exist.
  • I’ve heard it said, “This is no time to panic!” But what better time is there to panic than when reality is crashing down all around you?
  • How many people are we believers hoping to win to the love of Christ by acting like total jerks today?
  • If you have time to talk in depth about Madonna and hydrangeas, you may have too much time on your hands.
  • Making fun of Social Security is easy for rich people. For the rest, it’s the only security they have in a world where they are expendable.
  • I am the object at rest which tends to stay at rest. Upholding Newton’s Law 1a is my life. I don’t know about 1b or motion, just resting.
  • I mean if someone has spent a lifetime living hell-bent on being hellbound, will God not grant what that one has desired and lived for?
  • In the end, love wins. God wins. But that does not necessarily mean that He gets everything He wants. (Which sounds pretty selfish, really.)
  • There’s a significant percentage of my time on Twitter and Facebook that is enabled by Windows Update and Apple Software Update. Just FYI.
  • I have a new marketing motto for the folks at Huffington Post: “You Heard It First … Somewhere Else.”
  • Exhaling is the last thing I’d want to do.

It has been said that all of these are moot points, and I would find it difficult to disagree. However, if you would like to experience them as they are revealed by the great cosmic consciousness known as the Flying Spaghetti Monster, all you have to do is follow keith_brenton at Twitter.com.