Sunday Reflections
A few of my favourite quotes, and a bit of the patchwork to pull them together. It is, I think, appropriate in this 80th anniversary of V.E. Day, to look back at steps along that path.
Having listened to some discussions recently, it strikes me that one of the difficulties even Christians have is understanding the death of Jesus, and what it means.
The Alpha Course material took a good stab at this by providing , in the case of Father Kolbe, someone who was prepared to give his life in place of another man (who had a family) at Auschwitz. But that’s one man giving his life for another, taking another’s place. How can you extrapolate from that to Jesus somehow giving his life for everyone, born and unborn, throughout time? I think (and it appeared to others) that the analogy breaks down.
I think a better metaphor, but still one which is incomplete, would be to look at the troops involved in the D-Day landings. Many perished, but they didn’t just die, they died to set the world free from the Nazi tyranny, and they died not just for those at home, but for future generations who would be free from the Nazi yoke, including, it should be noted, Germans as well. They died in the fight to take back enemy territory and set it free.
A few of my favourite quotes, and a bit of the patchwork to pull them together. It is, I think, appropriate in this 80th anniversary of V.E. Day, to look back at steps along that path.
Having listened to some discussions recently, it strikes me that one of the difficulties even Christians have is understanding the death of Jesus, and what it means.
The Alpha Course material took a good stab at this by providing , in the case of Father Kolbe, someone who was prepared to give his life in place of another man (who had a family) at Auschwitz. But that’s one man giving his life for another, taking another’s place. How can you extrapolate from that to Jesus somehow giving his life for everyone, born and unborn, throughout time? I think (and it appeared to others) that the analogy breaks down.
I think a better metaphor, but still one which is incomplete, would be to look at the troops involved in the D-Day landings. Many perished, but they didn’t just die, they died to set the world free from the Nazi tyranny, and they died not just for those at home, but for future generations who would be free from the Nazi yoke, including, it should be noted, Germans as well. They died in the fight to take back enemy territory and set it free.
But you cannot say of any soldiers who died that they took the place of individuals back home or in Europe on whose behalf they fought, and on whose behalf they died, in the way that Father Kolbe did. Yet in a very real sense, they did die for each and every one of those and for us too, in the future they secured.
The D-Day connection also brings me to another theologian, Oscar Cullman and his ground breaking book “Christ and Time”. As various historians have noted:
“Although VE-Day was not until May 8, 1945, in a very real sense the war in Europe was over on June 6, 1944 — D-Day... The amassing of such military personnel and materiel, the relentless crushing of German factories from American aircraft, the ever narrowing of Germany’s supply lines — all this declared that the difference between D-Day and VE-Day was just a matter of time. And for this reason many have said that it was on June 6, 1944, that the war was over.” (Fred Zaspel)
And Cullman wrote:
“The decisive battle in a war may already have occurred in a relatively early stage of the war, and yet the war still continues. Although the decisive effect of that battle is perhaps not recognised by all, it nevertheless already means victory. But the war must still be carried on for an undefined time, until Victory Day.”
Cullman suggested this as a analogy for how Christians live, and an answer to the question: if Christ has defeated death and the oppressive powers within this world, how come they remain, and how come the world still seems such a mess?
He explained it as the tension of “already, not yet”. The Kingdom of God has been inaugurated, but that is D-Day. It will not be consummated until the end of time, at V.E. Day.
Tom Wright has also put it this way: “"The early church held on firmly to both sides of the apparent paradox: the end had happened; the end was yet to come. Paul writes from prison about his present suffering at the hands of persecutors and also about the triumphant victory that Jesus won on the cross over the principalities and powers. This is utterly characteristic. Both sides must be given the same stress."
Of course how we can understand that is difficult, and one of the ways is picture language. If the book of Revelation is seen as fragmentary picture language and not treated as some kind of literal time table (as unfortunately fundamentalist Christians do), then we will find in it all kinds of wonderful illustrations pointing beyond what can be imagined. But that’s for another day.
That is also why the Communion service in Christianity comes with a command, which we find in the letters of Paul: “For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.”
The communion service itself is a symbolic participation in the death of Christ, looking back to the last supper. Yet it is also a meal anticipating the feasts that occurs so often in the parables of Jesus, where we see images of the Messianic banquet. Again it directs us to see the now and then.
But how strange it is, if we stop to think about it.
A lot of religions, and especially the Gnostic religions which sprung up at that time, decried the physical world. The more Puritan sects in Christianity emphasised “the word of God” in preaching, and often didn’t really know what to make of this act of eating and drinking, except as an act of commemoration.
The D-Day connection also brings me to another theologian, Oscar Cullman and his ground breaking book “Christ and Time”. As various historians have noted:
“Although VE-Day was not until May 8, 1945, in a very real sense the war in Europe was over on June 6, 1944 — D-Day... The amassing of such military personnel and materiel, the relentless crushing of German factories from American aircraft, the ever narrowing of Germany’s supply lines — all this declared that the difference between D-Day and VE-Day was just a matter of time. And for this reason many have said that it was on June 6, 1944, that the war was over.” (Fred Zaspel)
And Cullman wrote:
“The decisive battle in a war may already have occurred in a relatively early stage of the war, and yet the war still continues. Although the decisive effect of that battle is perhaps not recognised by all, it nevertheless already means victory. But the war must still be carried on for an undefined time, until Victory Day.”
Cullman suggested this as a analogy for how Christians live, and an answer to the question: if Christ has defeated death and the oppressive powers within this world, how come they remain, and how come the world still seems such a mess?
He explained it as the tension of “already, not yet”. The Kingdom of God has been inaugurated, but that is D-Day. It will not be consummated until the end of time, at V.E. Day.
Tom Wright has also put it this way: “"The early church held on firmly to both sides of the apparent paradox: the end had happened; the end was yet to come. Paul writes from prison about his present suffering at the hands of persecutors and also about the triumphant victory that Jesus won on the cross over the principalities and powers. This is utterly characteristic. Both sides must be given the same stress."
Of course how we can understand that is difficult, and one of the ways is picture language. If the book of Revelation is seen as fragmentary picture language and not treated as some kind of literal time table (as unfortunately fundamentalist Christians do), then we will find in it all kinds of wonderful illustrations pointing beyond what can be imagined. But that’s for another day.
That is also why the Communion service in Christianity comes with a command, which we find in the letters of Paul: “For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.”
The communion service itself is a symbolic participation in the death of Christ, looking back to the last supper. Yet it is also a meal anticipating the feasts that occurs so often in the parables of Jesus, where we see images of the Messianic banquet. Again it directs us to see the now and then.
But how strange it is, if we stop to think about it.
A lot of religions, and especially the Gnostic religions which sprung up at that time, decried the physical world. The more Puritan sects in Christianity emphasised “the word of God” in preaching, and often didn’t really know what to make of this act of eating and drinking, except as an act of commemoration.
A lot of people in the modern world like to say they are “spiritual” not “religious”. There is a lot that harks back to the Gnostic distrust of the material world, and even in G.K. Chesterton's time, he talks of those "whose patience mostly consisted of waiting for others to rise to the spiritual plane where they themselves already stood.". What has the spiritual and enlightenment have to do with the crude physical world?
Now Christianity has developed creeds, statements of belief, and yet here, more important than any of those, at the heart is an act of physically coming together to eat and drink.
Now Christianity has developed creeds, statements of belief, and yet here, more important than any of those, at the heart is an act of physically coming together to eat and drink.
C.S. Lewis, I think, explains it well: “God never meant man to be a purely spiritual creature. That is why He uses material things like bread and wine to put the new life into us. We may think this rather crude and unspiritual. God does not: He invented eating. He likes matter. He invented it.”
And another aspect of communion that it is communal. It is about community. The statement in Matthew where Jesus says "Whenever two or three are gathered together I am with them" is often applied to prayer or church worship, but I think there is a decisive pointer here to the Lord’s supper, which after all we know from the sources was one of the earliest manifestations of Christian worship.
And another aspect of communion that it is communal. It is about community. The statement in Matthew where Jesus says "Whenever two or three are gathered together I am with them" is often applied to prayer or church worship, but I think there is a decisive pointer here to the Lord’s supper, which after all we know from the sources was one of the earliest manifestations of Christian worship.
It makes the statement that Jesus, and through the act of consecration, the ordinary material world becomes a place of sacred encounter.
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