Inside Our Delusion
Let me speak plainly. God has never required child sacrifice. It has never been His idea. Rather, it has always been humanity’s perversion—a perversion of God’s goodness and a mockery of the events that took place at the cross.
At the cross, the “Word who became flesh” stepped inside our cruel child sacrifice delusion and took that punishing transactional perversion to its conclusion. He set us free from our depraved death devotion.
For 2000 years, we’ve been awakening to this Truth. Strike that. Since the fall, we’ve been awakening to this Greater Love revelation.
Abraham, like so many today, believed the road to God went through the cruel and punishing sacrifice of his son, but God has always been like Jesus. Like an Emmaus Road Jesus, God walked beside Abraham on his road of lack, God’s true nature hidden even as He revealed Himself.
Like Jesus, God engaged with Abraham in the context of his understanding toward one end—to reveal a greater love that would reconcile Abraham to the Truth that sets him free.
On Mount Moriah, like Jesus on a cross, God stepped inside Abraham’s delusion and revealed that He is nothing like the cruel and punishing transactional gods of Abraham’s day, or those of Jesus’ day, or ours today.
God revealed to Abraham, and through him to us, that whether we understand it or not, whether we agree or not, He has always been like Jesus—a measureless love that has been reconciling us to Himself since before the fall…
This article is excerpted from my book, Leaving and Finding Jesus
ETERNAL LIFE WITH JASON CLARK
This podcast features Chapter Three of Jason Clark’s recent book, Leaving and Finding Jesus.
“We have been invited to trade a finite perspective with an infinite eternal life revelation—Christ in us, the hope of glory—and nothing separates us from His love! In John 17, Jesus prayed that we would know this union, this oneness, just as He and the Father were one. Further, He revealed there is no darkness light won’t penetrate, no brokenness that won’t be made whole, no road He won’t join us on, no soil the Seed won’t transform, no consequence of sin that His justice won’t restore—past, present, or future…”
For more on Leaving and Finding Jesus
Amazon
A Family Story Store
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JARED SCHOLZ / SANDBOX TO MUSEUM
“Wherever there is a culture of certainty, there is a culture of hypocrisy.” Jared Scholz
Faith has its messy seasons of intense digging. Some will carelessly demolish the precious hope, like a child with a Tonka truck in the sandbox. Others will work like measured archaeologists to uncover the museum-worthy gem they’d hoped for.
Following Jesus in real time, living responsive, rediscovering Jesus, an evolving and maturing faith, Love being our Cornerstone, the church, growing in trust, and humble leadership, in this conversation, the guys dive into Jared Scholz’s new book, Sandbox to Museum, a book that seeks to clarify the deconstruction landscape and help readers avoid the pitfalls of modern deconstruction.
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For more on Jared Scholz
Website: www.jaredscholz.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/jared.scholz.1
Sandbox to Museum: AMAZON
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JONATHAN FOSTER / indigo: the color of grief
“Exquisitely etched, in a luring cadence, a daughter lost, a family fractured, fractioned, all in the lower case, not shouting at us, but hard to read. I had to stop and regain my composure. What is this terrible beauty? Not a theology but something softer, more delicate, unprotected, exposed. What is this? A moving poem, certainly, but also a prayer, a wounded word, a broken hallelujah, where a random hug, a hand held through the night, a shoulder touched, are the only amelioration, the only God worthy of our time, the only God there may be, the only way to keep the future open.” John Caputo
In this conversation, the guys discuss Jonathan’s new book, indigo: the color of grief. This conversation invites the love of God into our loss, disappointment, and fragile trust.
“In this stunning reflection on loss and suffering, we do not simply observe one person’s grief but find words that might help us as we tarry with our own.” – Peter Rollins
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For more on Jonathan Foster
Website: www.jonathanfosteronline.com
Twitter: @jonathan_foster
Substack: jonathan_foster
Prepurchase through INDIGO: www.indiegogo.com/projects/indigo-the-color-of-grief#/
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My Hermeneutic
When I write, I hope to present ideas in a conversational tone as though we’re connecting over a good cup of coffee with a little Baileys, a generous amount of cream, and Karen’s berry rhubarb pie. I like to make suggestions through storytelling and what-if questions, but I’ve been told that on occasion, maybe, you know, every once in a while, I could just state my conclusions plainly.
When it comes to hermeneutics, the method by which we interpret Scripture, this is me making it plain.
Jesus, greater love, is my hermeneutic.
I approach the “word of God” in search of Jesus, the “Word Who Became Flesh.”
Jesus is the whole revelation of what God is like, and the cross is the clearest way to know Him and how He feels about us.
God has always been like Jesus, whether we knew it or not. That’s true today and was true for our Old and New Testament brothers and sisters.
The Apostle Paul put it this way, “For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.” 1 I share that same resolve in all things, including my approach to Scripture.
Now, here are some what-ifs.
What if any belief about the nature of God that contradicts cruciform love, even if it’s biblical, is untrue?
What if Scripture is an inspired collection of books that reveals how poorly humanity has thought about God in light of how good Jesus revealed God truly is?
What if the whole point of the Book is to empower deeper revelation of reconciling love, a greater discovery of the Truth that sets us free, and an awakening to our union in Christ?
What if we were meant to search Scripture so we might recognize the “Word Who Became Flesh” in every person standing before us?
What if we can know our hermeneutic is true based on if we love God, our neighbor, and ourselves more? I’m thankful to my friend Randal Worley for that thought. 2
For me, interpreting Scripture is not rocket science; it’s relational theology 101. But what did you expect from me? I’m a relational theologian with a Map reading learning disability. I am not educated enough to give you anything other than another what-if:
What if even our approach to Scripture is about a Love who laid His life down for His friends?
As a relational fella, all I can tell ya is, the more confident I become in reconciling love, the less hard stuff wrestling I do with the Book.
All I can tell ya is, if you’re intent on wrestling with hard stuff, make sure it’s about your systematic methods and current lack of understanding and not about your certainty that God requires child sacrifice.
All I can tell ya is, like Abraham, we can navigate our hard stuff understanding by placing our faith in a reconciling love that raises the dead to life.
In my experience, when cruciform love is the lens through which we know God, resurrection life is always the revelation, and there is no hard stuff in Scripture.
1 1 Corinthians 2:3
2 Mark 12:30-31
This article is excerpted from my book, Leaving and Finding Jesus
A Hard Teaching?
“Very truly, I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.” That visceral word picture capped a message Jesus gave to a large crowd of followers. (10)
On hearing it, many of his disciples said, “This is a hard teaching. Who can accept it?” “This is the hard stuff,” they thought.
But it wasn’t the hard stuff—just the opposite. It was a prophetic invitation to communion, a description of our participation in union, an invitation to consume and embody Christ within us. The words Jesus spoke, as He went on to explain, were “full of Spirit and life!” (11) The disciples just didn’t understand them—yet.
Jesus’ message revealed how Measureless Love reconciles and restores all humanity to Himself. Jesus’ words contained an invitation for the disciples to leave their limiting certainties and lean into faith. It was an invitation to engage with the Emmaus Road burning that cries out from deep within, “We knew eternal life in our hearts even when our heads heard cannibalism.”
“Does this offend you?” the Emmaus Road Jesus asked His disciples. For many, it did, and understandably so. “From this time, many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed Him.
‘You do not want to leave too, do you?’ Jesus asked the Twelve.
Simon Peter answered, ‘Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and to know that You are the Holy One of God.’” (12)
How had Peter and the remaining disciples come to believe that Jesus was the Holy One of God? That’s a good question.
In hindsight, we know their belief wasn’t extra-biblical, but neither, at that moment, could they have referenced chapter and verse. So, they hadn’t “come to believe” based on their current understanding of Scripture—nor was it because Jesus broke down His systematic theology. There was no biblical exegesis, just the Word Who Became Flesh speaking to burning hearts.
This was not an exercise in literal inerrancy. Rather, this was about faith. The disciples had come to believe and know that Jesus was the Holy One of God because, in the context of relationship, they recognized eternal life as the nuclear explosion burning within them when The Word Made Flesh spoke to them.
“You have the words of eternal life,” Peter said, trusting a measureless love that transcends dimensions of time and space, as well as finite understanding. Because they stewarded the burning, the disciples were not put off by their inability to understand Jesus’ offensive words.
They had “come to believe” God was better than their best understanding and current biblical interpretation.
It’s called faith.
This faith is discovered in the One who laid His life down for His friends, and this burning is the only way we can know God and truly interpret Scripture.
When our experiences and understanding seem like hard stuff, cruciform love and resurrection life can be trusted. And where we can trust, we don’t have to understand.
“…Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you….” There was literal error in Jesus’ words, but because the disciples were in a maturing relationship with Greater Love, even though they literally heard Jesus preach cannibalism, their hearts knew Jesus wasn’t preaching cannibalism…
This article is excerpted from my book, Leaving and Finding Jesus
Equality As Jesus Revealed It
Excerpted from my book, Leaving and Finding Jesus
When I wrote the book, God Is (Not) In Control, I juxtaposed the broken paradigm of sovereign control with the sovereignty of cruciform love to highlight how the teaching of sovereignty through control has undermined trust and access to intimacy within the church today.
God is love; love is self-giving, others-focused; love is relational. When control is the foundation of a relationship, there is no equality. Without equality, trust cannot exist. Without trust, intimacy becomes impossible. A master-servant hierarchy is a three-foot concrete median theology that cuts us off from knowing oneness and experiencing union.
Equality is God’s idea, revealed perfectly in the incarnation through the Triune relationship between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Jesus revealed equality as fully God and fully human. Greater Love was a walking revelation of equality, and it looked like oneness with Father and Holy Spirit—and with us.
When I write about our equality with God, I write as a created being about my Creator. I am not suggesting equality in the context of measurements. I am not applying that word like a Rich Young Ruler on the road of lack. There are no microscopes powerful enough to make us equal in that paradigm.
Instead, I’m describing equality as Jesus revealed it. It’s not “equals” based on measurements; it has nothing to do with finite thinking or microscopes. I’m writing about an equality revealed by Greater Love laying down His life for His friends. (1)
Self-giving, other-centered love is the birthplace of true equality and is discovered in union.
Jesus included us in this equality when He prayed we would be one, just as He and His Father were one. “And may they be in us so that the world will believe you sent me…”( 2)
And Jesus revealed the nothing will be impossible power of this equality when He healed that oppressed boy with faith no larger than a mustard seed.
Like the Farmer, Jesus knew the power of seed. He knew measureless love always transforms the soil…
Jesus was a walking revelation of equality as our heavenly Father sees it—self-giving love for His friends, you, and me. And through the cross, Jesus invited us to participate in this equality. He invited us to take up our cross—greater love—and live one with Love, here, now.
Greater love is the truest definition of equality— and it saves us.
The world is hungry for this mountain moving—heaven to earth—equality; where the impossible becomes possible, where friends of God don’t just offer mathematical equations, systematic theology, principles, and disciplines, but also a measureless reconciling love that is powerful and effective and can provide measurable results.
Some might be uncomfortable with my suggestion that God wants equality with us, but when we discover and define equality in the context of Greater love, well, it’s not just possible. It’s the gospel good news, the whole story! There is no separation; we are one and ever awakening to our union!
Jesus prayed that we would be one, that we would know union, and that we would experience the same trust, intimacy, and equality He experienced and shared with our Father and Holy Spirit.
This is the equality of heaven come to earth. It’s about a Love that prefers one another, a love that involves free will, submitted to free will. It’s the equality of husbands and wives submitting one to another because wives and husbands love each other as Christ loved the church. (3) It’s the equality discovered when we lay down our lives.
“Take up your cross and follow me,” Jesus instructed. (4) It was an invitation for us to awaken to oneness with Him, our Father and Holy Spirit—and with each other, just as Jesus modeled.
As we follow Jesus’ example of Greater Love, we will discover true equality, first with God in the form of union and then with each other in the same way.
And all creation waits in eager expectation for this greater love equality to be revealed by sons and daughters, fathers and mothers! All creation longs for racial, cultural, and social equality to be lived out by those in mustard-seed friendships, those who know union and live as expressions of this equality. 5
The whole world is hungry for a church whose prayers are powerful and effective, a people that can speak to a mountain, “Move from here to there,” and nothing will be impossible for us. I’m convinced the world is reconciled through friends living as expressions of greater love equality.
1 John 15:13
2 John 17:21
3 Ephesians 5:22
4 Matthew 16:24
5 Romans 8:19
This article is excerpted from my book, Leaving and Finding Jesus
CHERITH FEE NORDLING / A PERMANENTLY HUMAN GOSPEL
“The reason you can’t take your own human life seriously is because you’ve never taken my (Christ’s) life seriously.” The incarnation, Jesus as fully human, Jesus and His divinity, grace, cruciform love, leaving Gnosticism, resurrection fearlessness, freedom, and salvation as a human story; in this conversation, Cherith shares a beautiful gospel in which we are discovering how to enter into the life of Jesus!
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For more on Cherith Fee Nordling
The Open Table: www.opentableconference.com
Regent Website: www.regent-college.edu/faculty
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JONATHAN FOSTER / THEOLOGY OF CONSENT
“Consent is the depth of love…” Jonathan Foster shares about his book, Theology of Consent, where he blends René Girard’s scapegoating theory with open and relational theology. The guys talk about anthropology, mimetic theory, and the nature of love. This is a conversation for those deep in the forest of theopoetics, life, love, the church, and theology.
Please rate, review, share, and subscribe!
For more on Jonathan Foster
Website: www.jonathanfosteronline.com
Twitter: @jonathan_foster
Substack: jonathan_foster
Theology Of Consent: Amazon
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ALLEN ARNOLD / THE EDEN OPTION
“The world is accelerating in the wrong direction. It feels like all we’re doing is trying to fix what’s broken. And it isn’t working. We’re exhausted, overwhelmed, and losing heart. Where is God in all this? Well, he’s living a different story. A story he’s inviting us into.” That’s the back cover introduction to Allen’s new book, The Eden Option. In this conversation, the guys dive in and explore a homeward journey, not to the Eden of the past, but a new Eden discovered in Christ. Union, rest, community, creativity, miracles, and hope, in this podcast Allen shares his journey into trust and maturing faith.
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For more on Allen Arnold
Website: www.withallen.com
Twitter: @TheStoryofWith
The Eden Option: Amazon
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