Here’s what I said yesterday in the pulpit…
There’s no getting away from it. Sooner or later we do have to think about hell. That’s the message from this morning’s gospel reading and I don’t think that there is any choice but to deal with it head on and allow ourselves the chance to ask ourselves what we believe about it.
I must confess to groaning a little as I turned up the readings for today. Having just returned from a lovely holiday in what seemed like paradise (warm sun, clear sea, beautiful scenery, good food) I flicked through the lectionary to check out the gospel reading for this morning to see what I would be preaching about.
The rich man and lazarus stared me straight in the face. An uncompromising, difficult parable.
A rich man and a poor man (who has lain by the rich man’s gate) both die and the parable goes on to relate various discussions between Abraham and the rich man about their respective fates. Lazarus has gone to his reward which is represented as being with Abraham. Meanwhile, the rich man has gone to something altogether more fiery where he is tormented. A place which culturally we refer to as hell, though that’s not the word used in the story itself. We hear the rich man’s appeals for cooling water to refresh him. An act of mercy is requested. The answer is no.
We then hear him ask Abraham to send someone to warn his relatives so that they might not suffer the same fate as he has done. An act of compassion. The answer is no.
And there it ends.
I remember worshipping in a community once where the custom was to say, at the end of a reading from Scripture, “This is the word of the Lord†to which everyone replied, “Thanks be to Godâ€.
One day a friend of mine was reading a passage, I can’t remember whether it was this one or something quite like it. You could feel a sense of depression, misery and incredulity growing as he read it and then at the end simply looked around and asked instead, “is this the word of the Lord?â€
I find this passage a little depressing myself, so must dig a little harder than usual to find something to say about it which is encouraging and uplifting.
The first thing to say is that you can still find people, plenty of people, who believe that that if you die in sin you will go to hell and it will be fiery and nasty and horrid.
That’s not the kind of religion which does anything for me. If you want, I’ll happily point you towards churches which proclaim such grim teachings. However, even in the face of this morning’s gospel, I’m not remotely tempted to go down that path myself.
I don’t believe that it is in the character of the God I know to condemn people to a fiery hell. I believe that God loves us with a passion that burns away any of our own sins and leaves God relating to the person whom we long to be. Whole. Integrated. Free. Loved.
Hell just doesn’t come into it.
So let me just try to grasp hold of a few interesting things about this parable for us to latch onto.
The first thing to note is that this is not Jesus’s story. It exists in Egyptian stories and from other rabbis. Its a formula – a rich man and a poor man die and this is what happens in the afterlife.
Its a formula. You know how jokes have certain formulas. (Knock knock. Or A man walks into a bar. Or there was and Englishman, and Irishman and a Scotsman). Its that kind of story. The hearers would have known that it was a teaching story. They would have known the basics about the two men dying but htey would have listened out for Jesus’s own take on the story.
First thing to note is that the rich and the poor are divided only by their financial status. This is not a story about sin.
It is a story which seems to indicate that God is on the side of the poor rather than the rich.
Second thing to note is that they appear to have equal dignity and integrity. The rich man does not appear to oppress the poor man. Neither does Lazarus beg. They are simply rich and poor. And God seems to be on the side of the poor.
Third thing to note from Jesus is that we are supposed to work this truth out for ourselves. We won’t get messengers, angels or miracles. We simply have the world around us and the testimony of Moses, the prophets and so many religious figures from the ages saying simply – God is on the side of the poor, the disadvantaged, the underdog, the oppressed and the troubled.
It is these things that Jesus seems to be trying to convey to us through this parable, which only Luke reports – the gospel writer who emphasises God’s preference for the poor more than any other Biblical writer.
This parable is a storytelling way of proclaiming what Luke proclaimed in Mary’s song at the start of his gospel:
He has cast down the mighty from their thrones,
and has lifted up the lowly.
He has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.
It just may be that Jesus is talking economics rather than theology. It just may be that he is subverting old stories about heaven and hell to speak about daily politics, politics which are still with us today.
I must confess myself to be not a little puzzled by current politics in the UK. I used to think that I understood which parties represented the values that I care about most.
I can’t say that I do now. The jury is out on who can bring about mainstream prosperity and wellbeing which I think most people of goodwill long for.
However, I do know that the questions raised by any political debate are spiritual ones as well as economic ones for politics is a spiritual discipline as well as an act of persuasion.
Politics, economics, theology and spirituality all seem to me to be interrelated questions. Many people seem surprised by that these days though that might be one of the things which was at the heart of what the Pope was talking about in his recent visit to this great city.
But whatever I think, or whatever the Pope thinks, there is some evidence for thinking that this wee parable which seemed at first a little on the depressing side and all about hell may in fact be about finding strategies for building God’s kingdom on earth. With a God who seems to be on the side of the poor and disadvantaged, it matters little whether the starting point for change is prayer or politics.
And when I think about that, I find myself not depressed at all by the gospel reading this morning but rather more uplifted.
Indeed, my soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour.
In the name of God who made us, saves us and inspires us.
Amen.
To paraphrase Dave Allen making mock of Mr Paisley, angels and pins will be provided.
Kelvin wrote:
Ah, I see. Of course. The rich man (who is a character in a story anyway) could only possibly be saved by believing exactly the things you believe, Beat.
Worth noting linguistically that the Evangelical translators of the NIV offer us “hell†as a translation of “Hadesâ€. Other translators don’t.
Beat writes:
First of all, that’s a reduction of what I said. Of course we’re working in the hypothetical realm here. Why would you mention that as though I didn’t know the rich man is only a character from a story?
You’re proposing that I have read a passage, ignored its obvious meaning, and instead insisted that its meaning be in line with what I want to believe. The implication is that I want “what I have been taught” to be right, and I have allowed this desire to skew my judgement. I’m not immune to that, I admit. But that is also what I think you are doing, and of course you are just as susceptible. Relativism is no inoculation from this. Detachment in these circumstances is not an option, therefore when there are two different opinions, the non-detachment issue cancels itself out. The point is to demonstrate *how* a person reveals their position is founded more on a reasonable interpretation of the facts than on their desire to be right.
If we both have conflicting interpretations of the passage, they cannot *both* be right. They *could* both be wrong. However, can we agree that to propose that no true answer can be gleaned from the passage is arrogance of another level, because the proposer of *this* statement assumes they have a superior view of the issue…which usually turns out to be nothing more than a “once-removed” perspective, worth less than either of the primary perspectives. This is the arrogance of relativism. I cannot engage a relativist in an argument, except perhaps about relativism.(and even then, only relatively…)
So what is left in our conversation are two interpretations of a passage. Yours, which denies that the passage supports in any way the prospect of the reality of an enduring, painful hell for the sinner, and mine, which asserts the contrary. (I realise that neither of these are the primary assertions. We would both agree that social justice, caring for the poor etc… are affirmed as worthwhile and “good” by the passage.)
I am proposing that some of your arguments are akin to the great Sir Humphrey Appleby in “The Greasy Pole” (text below). He is explaining to the Minister ways in which he can discredit a report he doesn’t like.
My problem with your initial sermon came from your openly subjective tone. “That’s not the kind of religion that does anything for me”. This suggests to me that your religion is about what it “does for you”, rather than about what is objectively true or right. This is reinforced in your subsequent post when you say:
“I’m happy to help people to find that if that’s what they are looking for. ” So your main aim is really to accommodate those people who are willing to believe things that you approve of. Is that not just building a club?
So when you respond in a way that suggests that I’m just believing what I want to believe allow me to assert a few things
1. I desire to submit to biblical authority in all matters, even though this often requires discomfort and sacrifice when my own beliefs and desires contradict what I believe the bible teaches.
2. I struggle regularly to conform my “worldly” view of reality with the one proposed by scripture.
3. I do this because I have learned to trust God’s word as having authority and power to transform my life as a Christian, consistent with the bible’s own teaching in this regard. I have experienced the great blessing of submission, contrary to “common sense” teaching.
Therefore, between the two of us, it could be argued that I am less likely to believe merely what I want, because I express a willingness to be proved wrong by scripture, but you demonstrate a willingness for scripture to be proved wrong by your opinion.
Now I concede that even in this circumstance I am still inclined to try to bend scripture to my own outlook, thus getting a godly stamp of approval without having to undergo the pain of obedience or submission. But to take hold of God’s grace in the gospel of Jesus Christ means that I am enabled and encouraged *not* to do that. Because I know that I no longer have to cover up my sin, I am more prepared to confess it and have my priorities changed. I learn to allow God’s grace to meet my every need.
If you wish to propose an interpretation of a biblical passage which may be contrary to straightforward reading (and all scripture requires interpretation to some degree) then you must assert bases beyond your own personal preference. Otherwise, this places man’s own moral standpoint (which the bible says is flawed) as something of equal value to the teaching of scripture (which the bible asserts is the word of God). It is not sufficient to highlight flimsy workarounds when the subject matter is so important. This is a serious health and safety risk!
I take no pleasure in the prospect of Hell. I understand how “hellfire” preaching serves to turn more people off Christianity than attracts them. I take no perverse pleasure in thinking about how exclusive this teaching makes my little evangelical club. Yet I am entirely unwilling to ignore it, because that would be to deny what I believe to be true.
With regard to translations. I understand that gehenna and sheol and hell and hades have different meanings. The place described by Jesus in this parable, whatever name he gave it, was a perpetual place of suffering and torment. The rest of the story provides that detail, which limits the value of speculation in this instance to a purely academic level.
Ryan, I can’t help but think you willfully misunderstand virtually everything I say. For the record, I appreciate that different translators will offer different readings of the text. I appreciate the importance of even small words having crucial meaning in many instances. I also know that huge ideas hinge on certain single words, and not on others (as Kelvin alluded to earlier). I’m proposing that in this case, the gehenna issue is in the latter camp. It is not the hinge of the issue.
Eventually Ryan, I think you will need to start asserting what you DO believe, not just attempting to discredit what others believe. If you’re not prepared to build, but only deconstruct with “says you”, straw men, wilfull misinterpretation and scattergun doubt-casting, then you may eventually find that your only achievements will have been attempts to make nothing out of something.
Thanks once again Kelvin for letting me post my responses to your sermon. If I have been personally disrespectful at any point, or for any lack of clarity (and brevity!) I ask forgiveness. Work commitments mean I can not continue this indefinitely, but I will welcome any further comment, and end my contributions with the incisive words of Sir Humpy.
—–
“How to discredit an unwelcome report:
Stage One: Refuse to publish in the public interest saying
1. There are security considerations.
2. The findings could be misinterpreted.
3. You are waiting for the results of a wider and more detailed report which is still in preparation. (If there isn’t one, commission it; this gives you even more time).
Stage Two: Discredit the evidence you are not publishing, saying
1. It leaves important questions unanswered.
2. Much of the evidence is inconclusive.
3. The figures are open to other interpretations.
4. Certain findings are contradictory.
5. Some of the main conclusions have been questioned. (If they haven’t, question them yourself; then they have).
Stage Three: Undermine the recommendations. Suggested phrases:
1. ‘Not really a basis for long term decisions’.
2. ‘Not sufficient information on which to base a valid assessment’.
3. ‘No reason for any fundamental rethink of existing policy’.
4. ‘Broadly speaking, it endorses current practice’.
Stage Four: Discredit the person who produced the report. Explain (off the record) that
1. He is harbouring a grudge against the Department.
2. He is a publicity seeker.
3. He is trying to get a Knighthood/Chair/Vice Chancellorship.
4. He used to be a consultant to a multinational.
5. He wants to be a consultant to a multinational.”
Beat. You appear to be saying again and again that a reading of this passage which you think is the obvious meaning must be right and is a reading which all Christians must necessarily accept. No?
I don’t make such a claim myself. Neither about my reading of it nor anyone else’s.
The angels on pins expression always seemed strange to me. I can conceive of Tinkerbells type *fairies* fitting on the ends of pins, but Angels, surely, have always been pictured as human baby size at the very smallest? Wonder what the Sola Scriptura approach to this issue is. Maybe the pins of the Lord are the size of seven human ones 🙂
The equation of (universal) irresistible grace
would have to include:
no fall from innocence
no evil in the world
no necessity for the substituted Judgement of Christ
no call to repentance and faith.
The same control that (supposedly) imposes fellowship with God
upon and against the will of life-long unrepentant God haters
would also have been in effect denying mankind
the will to originally break fellowship with God.
The resolution of the Judgement of God is infinite
and echoes out to us from the cross in these words:
“Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthaniâ€
Anyone who thinks God who turned his back on Christ on the cross
will not turn his back on people is in need of a wake up call.
This also raises the question:
What kind of a people is God making for himself?
A people who have said “Yes you are my God”
Or a people God has spiritually lobotomized.
You know, it never occurred to me that anybody would run with such a literalistic reading of the passage.
To me the interesting questions are: what does it take to get a person believing in the teaching of the Prophets? (Answer: obviously a lot more than the teaching of the Prophets, since the rich man had them and ignored them)
Should we believe (as a strand of the Bible does) that God had blessed the rich man because he was good? Are riches given to those God favours (answer, no, Jesus thinks this is bosh)
To me this is not a teaching ‘be prepared for Hell it really is there’ – it is a teaching ‘sheesh, get believing, get giving, you’ve HAD all the teaching you could POSSIBLY need! Oh, and stop thinking you are something special because you have money – if you want God’s opinion of THAT just look at some of the people he give it to!’
I think it is naive to imagine Jesus was so literalistic that he expected high-blown stories taken literally – and not very complimentary to the Apostles to assume that that was how they understood Him.
To assume that Jesus was in desperate earnest (and I do) and terribly urgent (I do) is not to assume that he was deadeningly literal.
>>>Eventually Ryan, I think you will need to start asserting what you DO believe, not just attempting to discredit what others believe. If you’re not prepared to
build, but only deconstruct with “says
youâ€, straw men
Firstly, you showed up to ”discredit” what Kelvin believes about Hell. Which is of course fine, so it’s odd that you enter into ‘debate’ assuming that any attempts to criticise your peculiar beliefs are an attack. They’re not.
Greg, it’s not a straw man if you actually believe it. As for what I believe – I’m pefectly orthodox, and I’ve talked of specifics on many occasion. Although, to riot in understatement, I’m not exactly shocked that you didn’t bother to listen.
Is Calvinism a straw man or what you yourself have said, repeatedly, is the one true/most real form of Christianity? And I’ll happily talk about what I believe and defend it at length. How said that you seem incapable of doing this, and instead cast aspersions on Kelvin’s motivations. If you were a Roman Catholic then I would not of course accuse you of holding Calvinist beliefs – and if I did so unwittingly, characterising their beliefs on what they say, then I would apologise. The fact that you really regard Orthodoxy as the sort of thing voiced by Driscoll or (at best!) Calvin is a large part of the problem. Wilful anti-intellectualism can only take you so far, and I note that Kelvin has been making entirely commonsencial points, not making radical Chomsky-esque statements that can only be understood in Academia. I realise that you’re not used to environments that require grown-up debate, and that , in the thread relating to +Gene Robinson’s visit, you swiftly took your ball and ran away home when people challenged your wacky analogies and uncritical conflation of religous right dogma with orthodoxy. That said, cutting and pasting from Yes, Minister is at least (deliberately) entertaining.
>>>ignored its obvious meaning, and instead insisted that its meaning be in line with what I want to believe
Greg, assuming that a meaning that seems obvious *to you* is necessarily the correct one is arrogance, not humility.
B –
I was going to provide a list of all the points you’ve ignored but time, frankly, does not permit. It would, in all seriousness, be a lot quicker to cite messages that you haven’t wilfully ignored. Which is a shame. I’m sure you don’t want to give the impression that you’re ignoring what people say in favour of typing whatever vaguely Alpha-esque sentiments springs randomly to mind.
I realise that I should also have provided one, exhaustive reply but there are, as I’m sure you’d agree, only so many hours in the day!
However
>>>>The place described by Jesus in this parable, whatever name he gave it, was a perpetual place of suffering and torment.
Passages have been cited that support annihalationism. That you’ve ignored. Your logic would appear to be :
this passage shows that Jesus views Hell as a place of eternal conscious punishment. Therefore passages that suggest annihalationism must have a different meaning
It makes *just as much sense* to say:
These passages strongly suggest annihalationism. Therefore passages that suggest eternal conscious punishment must have a different meaning.
Such a methodoloy is, of course, absurd but (alas!) that does not make it a strawman. (of course this wouldn’t be true if you cited more widely the textual witness to your vision of Hell but you’ve not done that ;preferring, instead, a resounding testimony to your fine moral qualities and serious love of God and the Bible which all us non-Hellfire types so sorely lack) Not only that, but you ignored my pointing out of the parts of Scripture that *you yourself cherry-picked and quoted* that dont’ support your interpretation! Does ‘destroy’ mean something else when someone like me quotes it (even the Devil can quote scripture, eh?) in much the same way that ‘Hell’ seems, at all times, in all cases, and irrespective of the original word that it is being used in place of (!), must fit your image of medieval Fire-and-Brimstone torture chamber?
Even the crudest prooftexter knows to contextualise and, frankly, I’m boggled by the idea that whether Our Lord used the word hades, gehenna or something else doesn’t especially matter because the more evangelical translations establish that Hellfire must be being talked about! How is you picking a translation that best fits your presuppositions not, in fact, doing the very same self-aggrandising misreading that you accuse Kelvin of?
The Yes, Minister citing does remind me of the time when you said that ‘liberals’ remind you of the baddies in Pilgrims Progress. In the cold light of day this, perhaps, is not the smackdown denunciation of liberal theology that you thought it was.
Amongst the many,many, points you’ve chosen to ignore, it’s worth reiterating that there are , in fact, different readings than yours or Kelvins. I’m an annihalationist, not a universalist. And I did mention – as I do again – that many evangelicals (including those of our mutual acqaintance) very much do not believe in ‘Hell’ in the sense of eternal conscious punishment. And , given your adherence to evangelical culture and party lines that is surely better owed to God, presumably you wouldn’t want to slander their motivations and attitude to Holy Scripture like you have with Kelvin’s?
(I know it’s a Saturday, B, but if you post things then it’s only good manners to read them, take them seriously, and deign to reply!)
You had a pop at Kelvin with the following
>>>“I’m happy to help people to find that if that’s what they are looking for. †So your main aim is really to accommodate those people who are willing to believe things that you approve of. Is that not just building a club?
And yet you say that ” In defending what I regard as orthodoxy I don’t intend to systematically counter every possible interpretation that I don’t think is the right one”. Presumably you’d be ok with telling a liberal type not to go to St.Silas, yet Kelvin is , what, supposed to try and get everyone ( including, say, Roman Catholics who regard debates like this as yet-more proof of the need for the Magisterium?) to believe what he believes about Hell? Do you make a point of rebuking mere Lutharans or those non-salva-gratia Catholic types en route to their respective Churches? If someone asked you for directions to the nearest Catholic Church would you google-maps an evangelical church instead? The fact that a Calvinist fundamentalist like yourself is a member of church in The Scottish Episcopal Church, rather than a more obvious ideological home like ,say, the Zion Baptist Church or the Free Presbyterian Church of Ulster suggests ,surely, that it takes all sorts? (or hypocrisy, but I try and think the best about people)
Also – as a good Sola Scriptura type, you might want to think about the balance of your posts. I say this in all love. It feels like they consist of – at best – one part scriptural quotation or commentary on same, to five parts wackadoo analogies, to ten parts egotistical bombast. Yet you condemn those who use *in my opinion* or *I think* type qualifiers which are, surely, just good manners. Look at your message on the 30th September that, ignoring (again) the points people have been making in the interests of serious and respectful dialogue, you start up (c.f. ‘1. I desire to ‘) with the sort of thing more suited to AA or the rotary club (and that’s aside from the horrendously patronising implication that you’re somehow unique in taking God and the Bible seriously). Very little of what you type suggests any engagement with anything other people say, although your posts do serve up plenty of info for any prospective chronicler of The Sacred Story of G.D.B.
I do hope you can see the irony of your Yes, Minister quotation. You ignore, repeatedly, points people make in favour of windy misdirection – and, as justification, post some humour that makes fun of people who,er, engage in misdirection! And my citing of Driscoll, Calvin etc is hardly insulting – although , needless to say, I’m of course delighted if you’ve decided to repent of your love of US fundamentalism. It’s important to know where people are coming from. Contrast that with you assuming that Kelvin created some unique and cosily heretical doctrine of Hell out of (what?) wilful perversity (Kelvin did of course mention saints from the past that he is in line with but you ignored that like you ignored pretty much everything else).
It’s great when blogs can spark lots of responses on important issues, so thanks to Kelvin for hosting this and for such a gracious,speedy and dialogue-conducive moderation policy! 🙂