March 25-Phil.2-Eastmann-When I was younger, I heard people walk up and asked if you were saved. It meant: do you have a ticket to heaven. I prefer Richard Niebuhr’s reply: I was saved;I am being saved, I will be saved. The word for save is often the same word for healing in Scripture.Today we hear of Christ himself taking the form of a slave, to death by crucifixion -- the execution reserved for slaves and traitors in the Roman Empire. Paradoxically, our liberation comes from Christ's bondage, which is his entry into our bondage. we begin by hearing how Christ became like us, and continues to come among us. equal with God, to being in the form of a slave, in the likeness of human beings, in the appearance of a singular human being, obedient even to the point of death by crucifixion. Having been raised on a cross, Christ is exalted even higher by God, so that all creation will bow down and confess him as Lord.
For this very reason, the story of Christ also moves from separation to solidarity, and from difference to likeness, as Christ moves into the most despairing depths of human experience. In the form of a slave, he mirrors back to us the reality of our own enslavement to sin and death. He comes very near, so near that he "gets under our skin." God becomes one of our kind, kin to us. This is the incarnation, the life-transforming power that animates Paul's ethical teaching: "work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who is at work in you, enabling you both to will and to work for his good pleasure" (2:13) God gives us the desire and the energy to enact Christ's compassion in the world. The "you" is plural, showing that God is among us, having come among us as a slave, as one who serves. This divine companionship - the actual motivating power operating in and through those mutual relationships., the "salvation" we are to work out is not our private, individual destiny, but rather, the quality of our corporate life as it is lived under the rule of the Savior. Paul already has described this quality of life in terms of mutual love and affection, sharing in the Spirit, unity, humility, putting others first -- and all of this "in Christ" (2:1-4). And it is a public life, a public "politics."
(2:12) Incarnation’s path is the presence of God. This is the language of theophany. God's self-revelation issues in a transformed community,a manifestation of God's presence in the world.
Finally, the drama of salvation enacted by Christ (2:6-11)is a kind of theater that involves the audience in the action. it is God's action in the flesh, invading our worlds, catching us up into the saving work of God, making us also participants in the drama (theodrama). No longer mere spectators, we are part of the "spectacle" of God Holy Week incarnate.
Is 50 Tull-. Like that lamenter he walks in darkness, without light, and envisions a stance of trust despite confusion, despite opposition, despite present straits. The prophet teaches this vision to others, beckoning them to endure with hope, and through their endurance to become God’s light to the nation- that the things they have endured have meaning, and that their life has a future.Such a stance is not adopted easily. Ambiguous realities still persist. Throughout faith’s history, many turning points have presented themselves, many ambiguous moments at which decisions have been made to choose sturdy trust.some have trusted God through the midst of terrible darkness..
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