Jesus Cleanses the Temple

Like this post? Check out the (upgraded and expanded) full work, Simon, Who Is Called Peter! It combines the readability of First-Person narration with biblical and scholarly accountability in the form of copious footnotes, allowing you to see the world of the New Testament through the eyes of Jesus' most notorious disciple.

The day after the triumphal entry, Jesus came back to Jerusalem and the very first thing he did was put the smackdown on the moneychangers and sellers of animals in the temple courtyard. Apparently it didn't stick the first time, and Jesus knew that it would stick the 2nd time. But perhaps Jesus wanted to make a point, to put his Father's House in order, in the knowledge that it would remain in order as long as he was in the city. Perhaps Jesus wanted to die with his Father's House swept clean, once again a house of prayer for all nations, not a den of thieves.

There were no more crowds today. Everyone was already in Jerusalem, and we entered quietly. Jesus led us straight to the temple, and we stopped at the outskirts of the Court of the Gentiles. As we stood there, I began to feel what Jesus must have felt yesterday. The noise was incredibly loud—the money-changers sitting at their tables, the merchants shouting to the passers-by their wares and offers, not to mention the noise of what they were selling, the sheep and the oxen and the doves. The smell of all the animals was horrible, and manure littered the marble floor. The courtyard was full of people bustling around, buying, selling, exchanging. Those who wanted to worship in the Temple had to weave in and out of the tables and merchants and piles of manure: I felt sorry for the Gentiles who could not do even that, who had to stay out here and try to worship in the midst of this... this...

            Before I could finish my thought, I realized that Jesus was gone.[1] I looked around, spotting him just in time to see him kicking over the low table of the nearest money-changer, leaving Jesus face-to-face with the money changer himself.

The man jumped up, shouting and waving his hands, and his shouts of outrage rang out in the sudden silence of the courtyard, as everyone in the area stopped what they were doing and turned.  But then the man’s face went pale and his shouts died as he recognized the man who just yesterday had been hailed by the entire city as a savior. Maybe he even recognized Jesus from that first time, years ago, when Jesus had actually taken a whip to them.[2] But the man stood there only for an instant more before mumbling apologies and fading back into the crowd. The coins from the table had not even stopped rolling before Jesus moved on to another table, kicking that over as well, and then the spell of silence was broken, and the entire courtyard burst into noise and frantic movement. Several of the money-changers began to hurriedly pack up their things, only to find Jesus already there, overturning their tables and scattering their coins. No one moved to stop Jesus: no one dared.

Jesus moved quickly, here kicking over a table, there upsetting the animals and driving them out of the courtyard, all the while shouting “Get out!” But it was not chaotic or random. He never pushed anyone who was already leaving, and he did not harass those who were actually there on Temple business. It was only when the courtyard was almost empty of the buyers and sellers that I realized that we, the disciples, had done nothing. We were still standing, frozen, where Jesus had left us. We watched Jesus in stunned silence as he stood still, in the middle of a wide circle empty except for the broken tables and fallen coins. He was breathing hard, and his face was tight and stern. And when he spoke, he was clear and distinct, each word crisp and sharp.

            “Is it not written,” he cried, turning to glare at all who were watching him, “that ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations?’ But you have made it a den of robbers!” The people he had driven out had stopped at the edge of the courtyard, grouping together and talking angrily among themselves. But when Jesus spoke, some of them became ashamed, and the others, seeing that the people supported Jesus, began to leave quietly. Most of the others, those who had not been selling, were listening with bowed heads. Jesus continued.  “This will not continue! This is a place of prayer and worship. You will not buy or sell or cheat or swindle here! Nor will you carry anything through here!” I could see, at the edge of the crowd, some who were carrying goods. When Jesus said this, they turned and began to go around. They clearly did not want Jesus to scatter their goods as well across the Temple floor.

            Jesus glanced around the crowd once more, gestured for us to join him, and began to clean the courtyard floor of what he had scattered. We began to help as well, some of us running to get brooms to sweep, and Judas took charge of gathering the coins, saying they would give it all to the poor. We continued working, but Jesus stood from his work and smiled when he saw a blind beggar carefully and reverently picking his way forward through the crowd. But it wasn’t just one beggar, I saw. It was all of them, all the beggars who made the temple their regular gathering place, [3] and they were all coming to see Jesus.

“Is Jesus still here?” the blind man asked, and Jesus himself answered him, with a touch to his eyes and a few words, and then the man opened his eyes, joy and surprise competing over his face. But before he could thank Jesus, Jesus had moved on to a lame man, dragging himself across the courtyard, and after that to another blind man. Jesus healed them all. It reminded me of one of our very first nights in Galilee, when all the cripples of the area had showed up on my doorstep. As then, Jesus healed all who came to him, and after there were no more to be healed, he taught until it was dark.

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[1]This event taken from Matthew 21:12-14, Mark 11:15-19, and Luke 19:45-46.

[2] Lenski (Matthew 812) advises against conflating the cleansing of the temple recorded in John 2:13-22 with the cleansing recorded in Luke 19:45-47, Matthew 21:12-16, and Mark 11:15-18. Religious authorities challenge him in John’s narrative, but not in the synoptics. The wording and tone differs between John and the synoptics, and in John the words are Christ’s own, whereas in the synoptics he quotes scripture. MacArthur (Matthew16-23 267) and Hendriksen (Matthew 769) say the same. Given the weight of evidence and opinion, I have treated them as two separate events.

[3]MacArthur notes that the “diseased and crippled, most of whom were necessarily beggars, continually gathered at the temple” (Matthew 16-23, 271).

The First Day in Jerusalem

What follows is my account of the first few hours following the Triumphal Entry. They were not in Jerusalem very long before they left, but those few hours were very significant (especially to John).

We had not anticipated the crowd. They slowed our progress so much that it was already afternoon by the time we actually made it into the city. Jesus dismounted once he entered the city, and we left the donkey at the gates with a man whom Jesus had healed the last time he was in Jerusalem. Some of us left, either to see friends or family or just to look around Jerusalem again. I followed Jesus closely as he walked through the city, leading the way straight to the temple, but he stopped so suddenly at the entrance that I nearly bumped into him. He was stiff, breathing heavily, and I looked around him to see–nothing out of the ordinary. There was a constant flow of people entering and exiting the Temple, and the merchants selling sacrificial offerings only added to the chaos of the courtyard. It was so loud, with the crowds and the merchants and the animals, that you could hardly hear yourself think. I looked at Jesus’ face, and followed his gaze—he was looking at the money-changers and the merchants. Then I remembered the first time we had been in Jerusalem, and what Jesus had done then.[1] But he did nothing like that here—after a few tense moments, he turned around, and we followed.

We walked in silence and let the noise of the crowd, the music, the shouting, the laughter, wash over us. I wondered how Jesus could not be cheerful here, in Jerusalem, at Passover. I wanted to ask, but as always, I could not. He would tell me, once again, that he would die here, and leave me, once again, confused. Luckily, I soon saw Andrew pushing his way towards us through the crowd, with Philip next to him. I pointed them out to Jesus, and we waited for them—when they arrived, Andrew was the first to speak.

“Lord,” he said, bowing slightly, “Some Greeks sought us out, saying they wanted to meet you. Should we bring them here?”

I had been listening to him as he talked, and when he was done I turned back to Jesus. His face had fallen again, and he did not say anything. He stood there, head bowed, face sorrowful, in silence. I looked at Philip and Andrew—they looked back at me, puzzled. I leaned back slightly to look at John and James, on the other side of Jesus—they did not know what was happening either. I was about to break the silence, ask the question again—perhaps he had not heard the first time—when Jesus spoke.

“The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified,” he said, but there was something about the way he said “glorified” that made me shiver. It did not sound like a happy occasion. He looked up at us, as we all grouped together to be before him, and the noise of the crowd washed over us as we waited.

“Truly, I tell you, that unless a grain of wheat falls and dies, it remains alone; but if it does die, it bears much fruit.” He spoke so suddenly, so passionately, that a few of us jumped at his voice. Jesus was practically shaking—he was moving his hands as he talked, and he began to pace, his voice going sometimes faster, sometimes slower. But he would always look back to us, seeing if we understood. We did not—but neither could we say anything. He spoke on.

“Whoever loves his life must lose it—but whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.” Here his eyes came up, earnest and filled with pain, and my breath caught in my throat. Listen to me, his eyes said. “If anyone would serve me, he must follow me—and where I am, there my servant will be as well. And if anyone serves me, the Father will honor him.”

He stopped pacing, stood still, head bowed once more, and the noise from the crowd filled the silence. More and more people were stopping to watch and listen to Jesus, and as they did they fell silent, as we were. We still could say nothing, could do nothing, either to comfort or respond. The question that had begun this talk was seemingly forgotten. After a short time, Jesus began again, lifting his head to look at us, and his voice was low and halting.

“Now I am troubled in my very soul,” he said. “What will I say? Will I call upon my Father and say, ‘Save me from this hour?’[2] But-” he raised his voice and threw up his hands, “But it is for this purpose that I have come to this hour! Father,” he cried, so loudly that almost everyone nearby stopped and turned towards him in surprise. “Glorify your name!”

And instantly there was the voice again, the voice we had heard on the mountain, loud, like thunder: “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.” And we fell to the ground, bowing, but before I did I saw Jesus smile, and when I looked up afterward he was standing straighter than he had been, shoulders back, head up towards heaven—it was as if he was basking in his Father’s voice.

We knew what we had heard. The crowd, though, the people around us, seemed to think it was thunder—some said it was an angel, but they had not understood the words. We had, but as we raised ourselves up, Jesus gave us no chance to question him, but spoke, loudly, to both us and everyone else listening to him.

“The voice has come for your sake, not mine,” he said. “Now is the judgment of this world: now will the ruler of this world be cast out! And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” The people did not like this. There was muttering, which quickly grew to shouting, and one, in the front, stepped forward and said, “The Law says that the Christ remains forever. How can you say that the Son of Man will be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man?” We looked at each other silently—we had some of the same questions. The Christ was supposed to remain forever. We knew that Jesus was the Christ. Why, then, did he always say that he would die here?

Jesus sighed and seemed to shrink. His face lost the glow it had had after the voice spoke from heaven. “The light is with you for a little while longer,” he said sadly, and the crowd grew quiet to hear him speak. “Walk while you have the light, lest darkness overtake you.” As he spoke, he grew louder and more forceful. “He who walks in darkness does not know where he is going. While you have the light, believe in the light, that you may become sons of the light!” And with that he turned, walking quickly through the streets towards the gate, and we followed. It was getting late, and without a word he led us back out of the city, through the gates, over the Mount of Olives, and back to Bethany. There were no more crowds, and the few stragglers still coming into the city did not even notice us.

We talked among ourselves as we walked, several paces behind Jesus. What had happened? The day had begun so well—the whole city had supported Jesus, and the Pharisees could do nothing to him. But it was as though Jesus did not even see any of it—or if he did see it, it only made him sadder. The city made him sad. The temple made him angry. What was supposed to be a celebration was, instead, only making Jesus more and more depressed. He did not say anything, even after we got back to Bethany. We ate in silence, and he went outside to pray, and we went to bed.

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[1]Lenski (Matthew 812) advises against conflating the cleansing of the temple recorded in John 2:13-22 with the cleansing recorded in Luke 19:45-47, Matthew 21:12-16, and Mark 11:15-18. Religious authorities challenge him in John’s narrative, but not in the synoptics. The wording and tone differs between John and the synoptics, and in John the words are Christ’s own, whereas in the synoptics he quotes scripture. MacArthur (Matthew16-23 267) and Hendriksen (Matthew 769) say the same. Given the weight of evidence and opinion, I have treated them as two separate events.

[2]Scholarly opinion varies regarding this passage. Lenski (John) states that the “What shall I say?” of John 12:27 is continued in the next sentence: “(Shall I say) ‘Father, save me from this hour?”, with the implied answer of, “No, because this is what I came for.” (869). However, Hendriksen (John) sees the first (What shall I say) as a question and the second (Father, save me from this hour) as a direct request, (199) seeing it as analogous to the plea of Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane (Matthew 26:39, Mark 14:36). The structure of the sentence, especially the “but” of the following sentence, leads me to accept Lenski’s interpretation over Hendriksen's. Christ is afraid of what is to come, and he certainly wishes that things could be otherwise: nonetheless, he remembers his purpose. He recognizes the possibility of calling to his Father, he may even be contemplating it: but he does no more than that, for he recognizes that to do so would be in direct contrast to what he knows his purpose to be.

As you follow Peter through the story we've all heard so many times, remember that to him and the rest of the disciples, there was no surety of the resurrection, no comfort in the promises of God--only mysterious words and incoherent outbreaks from the one they had staked their hopes and even their very lives on. They didn't understand, and indeed, coming from their background, it's hard to blame them.

If you enjoyed this, feel free to look at the second cleansing of the temple here.

Like this post? Check out the full work, Simon, Who Is Called Peter! It combines the readability of First-Person narration with biblical and scholarly accountability in the form of copious footnotes, allowing you to see the world of the New Testament through the eyes of Jesus' most notorious disciple.

Palm Sunday - A Petrine Perspective

I want to try and do something different this week: I'll be taking sections from my book "Simon, Who is Called Peter" and posting them throughout the week on the day that (roughly) corresponds to them. First, of course, we have the Triumphal Entry.

We were on our way to Jerusalem, and we walked in silence, as we had been doing more and more often lately.[1] We had stopped near Bethphage, where Jesus had sent Matthew and my brother Andrew[2] into town to get a donkey for Jesus to ride on. A donkey! Jesus sat on the ground, a little apart from the rest of us, and his head was bowed. He had been so tired lately. He had not asked us to be quiet, but we were anyway—when we talked, it was in whispers, and after a while even those had stopped. I looked up at the sky. Andrew and Matthew should be back soon. In fact—

I elbowed John lightly, and when he looked at me, I nodded towards Bethphage. There, leaving the town, were Andrew and Matthew, leading two donkeys, one older and one younger, a colt. I stood up and walked over to Jesus, making more noise than I needed to. Luckily, he looked up when I drew near, and instead of speaking I pointed to the two with the donkeys. He looked, and nodded, and when he began to rise I offered him my hand—he took it with a quiet word of thanks. I had never seen him so tired, not even when we had been up all night. I wanted to say something, to tell him I understood—but I did not. We were going to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover, but we all knew that something more was going to happen, and it was that something more that was weighing on Jesus. Why else would Jesus want a donkey to ride on? Then again, if he was going to ride on something, why did he pick a donkey? I did not know any of this. So I stood there next to him, in silence, waiting for the others to arrive with the colt.

They got there soon enough, and I realized—the donkey did not have a saddle. Jesus was at the donkey’s side, about to get on, and I said, “Lord, wait.” He stopped and looked at me, and instead of saying anything else I began pulling my robe over my head. I moved quickly, and when the robe cleared my head I saw John and James doing the same thing, while the others looked on, puzzled at first but then realizing what was happening. I draped the robe over the donkey, folding it a few times, and John and James did the same. I felt the resulting pad with my hand—it was quite thick, so we helped Jesus mount the donkey, and then we continued on towards Jerusalem.

As we drew nearer to Jerusalem, going up the Mount of Olives, we heard shouting, lots of people shouting. Soon we saw the people, coming over the hill from Jerusalem—they must have heard that Jesus was coming, because we heard his name among the shouts. As they came, those disciples who still had their robes took them off—Andrew was the first, quickly, awkwardly pulling his robe over his head and laying it down in the dust before Jesus and the colt. The others followed, and then many in the crowd did the same, and those who did not have robes cut palm branches. I saw one man, having put his robe on the ground, pick it up again after Jesus had passed over it, but he did not put it back on. Instead he folded it, treating it with the utmost care and making sure it did not fall. Others were doing the same—their cloaks were now something holy to them. From that point on, from the Mount of Olives to Jerusalem, I do not think the donkey’s feet touched bare dirt again.

More and more people were streaming from the city the entire time, and they were still shouting—although now it was more of a chant. I recognized many of them: some had followed Jesus themselves, although not everywhere he went, and others had seen many of Jesus’ powerful works. They were chanting various things, in different parts of the crowd, but one phrase that came again and again was, “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!” After the first couple of times we heard it, we twelve joined in as well. We were happier than we had been in some time. I looked to Jesus—he had said the he was coming here to die! Well, here he was, in Jerusalem, and it seemed as though the whole city had emptied to welcome him. So I looked at him, expecting the frown, the tiredness, to be gone, but it was, if anything, worse than ever. Why?

A stir in the crowd, a parting, signaled the arrival of the Pharisees. I frowned. They must have known that Jesus was the cause of the crowd, and they were coming to make more trouble. Although... I laughed. They had to push their way through the crowd. Everyone was so focused on Jesus that they paid no attention to the Pharisees, and their faces, angry and worried, caused me to smile. What could they do to Jesus now that the whole city was behind him?[3]

They continued pushing, making slow but steady headway through the crowd, until they reached Jesus. They finally broke through the crowd and, ignoring us, walked up to Jesus and stood in front of him, stopping the donkey. They drew themselves up, gathering their robes about them, and the one in the lead said in a loud voice, “Rabbi, rebuke your disciples!"[4] I chuckled again. It would have been impressive, even frightening, in most circumstances: here, when his robes were disheveled and dirty from the press of the crowd, when his voice could barely be heard over the constant chanting and praising, it was almost pitiful. 

I looked to Jesus, and saw, to my surprise, a flash of anger as he drew himself up on the donkey and said, in an even louder voice, “I tell you, if these were silent, the very stones would cry out!” The Pharisees were stunned—they, too, were angry, but then they must have realized their position. They were alone among hundreds, maybe thousands, of people all praising Jesus. They withdrew, once again becoming lost in the crowd, and Jesus fixed his eyes on the top of the mount, to which we were now quite near. I knew what he was thinking, because I was thinking it too. Over that hill was Jerusalem. It was always something incredible to come over the hill and see it there, remember its history and see its beauty.

We drew closer, closer, and then we were over—there it was. Jerusalem, the Holy City, and within it the Temple, its golden roof shining in the sun, with Zion hill behind it.[5] I looked back to Jesus, to see his reaction as he crested the hill, and—it was strange. His face crumpled and tears ran down his face when he saw Jerusalem. I hurried back, to ask him what was wrong, but he did not see me. He was still looking at Jerusalem, weeping, and speaking half-to-himself, the words almost lost in the tears. “If only you had known, on this day, the things of peace... But now they are hidden from your eyes!” He stopped, apparently unable to continue for a moment, but then he began again. “The days will come upon you, when your enemies will besiege you, hem you in on every side... and they will tear you to the ground, you and your children as well. And they will not leave one stone upon another, all because you did not know the time of your visitation...” He stopped, still looking at the city, and I walked alongside him. I looked around—most of the others had not noticed. John and James had, as had Andrew, and they looked at me questioningly, but I could only shrug. Was he talking about Jerusalem? What did he mean, the things of peace? Who would besiege us? Surely no one could, not with Jesus there. We walked on, still surrounded by the ever-growing crowd, still hearing the ever-present chanting and cheering, but the spirit was gone from we few who had seen Jesus weeping.

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[1]This event taken from Matthew 21:1-11, Mark 11:1-11, Luke 19:28-44, and John 12:12-36. It represents my understanding of the chronology of the triumphal entry, as synthesized from the four gospel accounts

[2]The two disciples sent for the donkey remain anonymous in all accounts. I give them names merely for the sake of the narrative.

[3]The crowd is so large that it causes the Pharisees to say to one another, “You see that you are gaining nothing. Look, the world has gone after him” (John 12:19). This event, causing despair among the Pharisees, would be sure to cause jubilation and excitement among the disciples. “Surely,” they must be thinking, “all that the Pharisees have planned has come to naught. The whole world has come after Christ!”

[4]The words of the crowd (Luke 19:38, John 12:13, Matthew 21:9, Mark 11:9) imply that Jesus is coming into the city not by his own authority as an earthly rabbi, but by YAHWEH’s direct authority and power (Lenski, Luke 965). This would, of course, have been deemed blasphemous by the Pharisees, hence their command to Jesus to rebuke his disciples, meaning to stop them from saying these things.

[5]This description of Jerusalem taken from Lenski (Matthew), 963. 


I'll be posting more over the week. If you want to read the whole thing, just let me know and I'd be happy to email it to you. Let me know what you think.
Update: Check out the rest of Day 1 here.

Like this post? Check out the full work, Simon, Who Is Called Peter! It combines the readability of First-Person narration with biblical and scholarly accountability in the form of copious footnotes, allowing you to see the world of the New Testament through the eyes of Jesus' most notorious disciple.

Theodicy of Glory

Taken from Evangelical Outpost:

“A chance for Faramir, Captain of Gondor, to show his quality…”

J.R.R. Tolkien, The Two Towers

Caution: The following post contains a slight spoiler to G. K. Chesterton’s The Man who was Thursday.  Read the book and then come back to read this afterwards. I’ll wait.

Given an omnipotent, fully good and loving God, why do good people suffer?

That is the question for the ages. The suffering of bad people, of evil people, is (for some) an easier question. There is a notion of cosmic reparation, whether of impersonal karma or personal Justice, that provides an explanation on that front. But what of good people?

That, at least, is a question asked repeatedly by characters in G. K. Chesterton’s The Man who was Thursday, and the answers Chesterton hints at are some of the most incredible I have ever read.

But first, we must eliminate the greatest of the false trails apologists often stray down: that human goodness is never good enough in comparison to Christ’s perfection. This relativity, while actual, is nonetheless irrelevant. The goodness and righteousness even of fallen humanity is real enough and meaningful enough to be attested to even from the throne of Jehovah himself. I trust ye have heard of the patience of Job?

The question, therefore, is not one of goodness. Any answer which depends on any concept of “deserving” is no answer at all, but merely a dodge—a dodge in the finest tradition of miserable comforters and worthless physicians the world over.

Having avoided the dodge, we return to Chesterton, who illuminates a facet of theodicy that I have never before and never again seen illuminated so clearly and eloquently:

Why does each thing on the earth war against each other thing? Why does each small thing in the world have to fight against the world itself? … So that each thing that obeys law may have the glory and isolation of the anarchist. So that each man fighting for order may be as brave and good a man as the dynamiter. So that the real lie of Satan  may be flung back in the face of this blasphemer, so that by tears and torture we may earn the right to say to this man, ‘You lie!’ No agonies can be too great to buy the right to say to this accuser, ‘We also have suffered.’

This is what I have long thought of as the “theodicy of glory.” Without adversity, there can be no perseverance, only the potential for perseverance. Without overwhelming odds, there can be no valor. Without fear, there can be no bravery.

And without these things, each and every believer is subject to the great accusation that begins the conflict in Job. Without these things, we are unproven, untested, and even Satan himself could rightly claim to have persevered through suffering, while we ourselves could not. Without this, all the saints are open to the accusation that they loved God merely because they were safe, and not for any other reason.

Why do the people of God often feel alone? Why do they often suffer? Why do they, at times, seem to fight against the entire world?

So that they may stand firm despite their loneliness. So that they may remain resolute in their suffering. So that they may feel the same distress and pain as those who reject God, yet emerge victorious.

And by this, by their blood and sweat and tears, the people of God may earn the right to say with pride, “I have fought the good fight, though armies were against me. I have finished the race, though terrible obstacles stood in my path. And I have kept the faith, though the world itself tried to take it from me.”

Having passed through the fire and emerged triumphant, the saints will take no heed of the Accuser, for his talk is meaningless. And at the end, they will receive their crown of righteousness from nail-scarred hands and hear the voice which echoed from the cross of Calvary say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”

Thursday is, in many important ways, a parallel of the book of Job, and this is as far as the story of Job takes us. Thursday, however, goes further. Job (and Thursday himself) are thus free from the accusation of safeness and surety and happiness. But to Chesterton, the final piece of the puzzle is found when God—the same God who spoke out of the whirlwind in power and majesty—places himself on the cross and refuses to come down. In this way God himself puts the Accuser forever to shame, and proves that he is God and he is Good even when he is not safe, even when he is not happy.

And while this may not always put my reason at ease, I can say, along with Thursday, that it puts my heart and soul at ease.

Follow-up Post written here:

The above post was actually much harder to write than I thought it would be. When I have something turning over and over in my head for years on end (as is the case with the theodicy of Chesterton), it's actually fairly difficult to flesh out the connections between my various thoughts. And continuing with my tradition of giving you guys something extra, here it is:

(Spoiler Alert for The Man who was Thursday)
Chesterton's The Man who was Thursday is basically Job, with the addition of one crucial element: The Incarnation and the Cross. The book of Job takes us to a place where we can accept suffering from God, even though we don't know why. Job is comforted not by reason, but by the sight of God himself. God doesn't give him any answers, yet Job withdraws his complaint and is satisfied.

However, that is where Job stops, because there is literally nowhere else to go. God is God, and, as God says, feel free to create your own universe if you're not happy with this one: Until then, stop whining about it. That's all that can be said on the matter.

Until the cross. Until that day when it is not man suffering under the bitterness God hands him, but God Himself suffering. Karl Barth says it best:

"In the Old Testament there is always the antithesis between the righteous God and the bitter things which man has to accept from Him without murmuring. In the passion story of the New Testament this antithesis is done away. It is God Himself who takes the place of the former sufferers and allows the bitterness of their suffering to fall upon Himself."

When I read this passage, I immediately did some research to see if there was any possibility that Chesterton could have been influenced by Barth, or Barth by Chesterton. The result: Maybe? Probably not. But that amazing, incredible moment when Syme, having proclaimed to Gregory that he has not been happy, turns to Sunday and asks, in a slow, stuttering voice, "Have you ever suffered?"...

And he is answered by a "commonplace text that he had heard somewhere: 'Can ye drink of the cup that I drink of?'"

When Job demands an answer of God, God replies with a flurry of questions, all unanswerable. Here, Sunday replies with just one question, but even more unanswerable. God's answer to the suffering of the world is not to stand aloof, but to descend into it and drink more deeply of the bitter cup than any mere man could do.

Unsatisfied

CAUTION: THIS POST CONTAINS SPOILERS CONCERNING THE PREVIOUSLY AWESOME, NOW TOTALLY DUMB AND STUPID TV SHOW DOWNTON ABBEY:

Anna and I just burned through all of season 3 of Downton Abbey. As the season prepared to enter it's final five minutes, Anna and I were leaning back on the couch, marveling at how smoothly they'd wrapped up the season... and then Matthew, who had been as baller as baller could be throughout the entire season, and whose wife had just given birth to their first child, got into a fatal car accident, and WHAT THE HELL, MASTERPIECE THEATER? WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?

At least, that's what I was yelling at my t.v. during the final minutes of Downton Abbey's last episode for almost an entire year.

It really threw off my groove. I was prepared for a smooth, happy finale a la the greatest finale in the history of television. Everyone had gotten their happy ending: Even Thomas had redeemed himself (as much as could be expected). If the episode had ended even two or three minutes sooner, it would have been freaking amazing.

In short, I am unsatisfied.

I am unsatisfied with how the writers of the show chose to end their season. I am unsatisfied that their long tradition of ultimately rewarding virtue ended in the senseless death of a new father, a faithful husband, and frankly an absolutely baller dude.

I know the arguments: I went through my writing classes at Biola hearing them over and over again. How good stories reflect reality, and how reality is fallen. How a happy ending is a sure sign of naivete, and how a sad ending is a mark of intelligent realism. This sad attitude of cynicism has pervaded modern retellings even of explicitly "escapist" literature (in the Tolkien sense of the word), so I suppose I shouldn't be surprised to find it here.

But I was surprised. Up until this point, the world of Downton Abbey had been one of a very "Proverbsy" nature: Good is rewarded, and the traps of the evil are sprung upon the ones who set them. But the end of this season seems to be a surrender to the prevailing "realism" of the age: The cynicism that would end the gospels with the crucifixion, that would rather end the book of Job with our hero waiting for an answer that never comes.

Granted, the point of this post was stronger when I thought that Downton Abbey was only going to be 3 seasons long (I must have gotten it confused with my beloved Sherlock). But to end the season with a shot of blood slowly snaking past the dead, open eyes of a new father, while his wife expectantly awaits his return, rubs me the wrong way.

Because yes, that may be what "real life" is like. But that is not nearly the same as reality. The reality is that the wail of Ecclesiastes has been drowned out by the gloria of the angels. The tomb of Christ marks a mere intermission, where the old scenery of Act 1 is cleared away to make room for Act 2.

Downton Abbey has done a lot of amazing things (in fact, I'm already planning a second post talking about some those things), but in this case, it failed. It settled for reflecting "real life", at the expense of reality. The show may redeem itself in the season to come, but for now, we are left with a shattered estate, a shattered marriage, and a multitude of shattered lives. And I am unsatisfied.

The Good, The Bad, and the Swell: Thoughts on Modern Worship

I think that certain strains of modern worship do some things really well, and some things really poorly. I’ll be using my own church as my primary example, since this is (obviously) where I experience the most “corporate worship.”

First, the good.

Freaking awesome guitar solo as the bridge.

This is often one of the first things people attack in modern worship. But I think a very strong case can be made for the electric guitar’s rightful place in worship music.  In Orthodoxy, G. K. Chesterton notes that “in this world heaven is rebelling against hell. For the orthodox, there can always be a revolution; for a revolution is a restoration.” Satan is the (temporary) prince of this world, and to Chesterton, to be a Christian is to be defiant, to be an ultimately triumphal revolutionary. And to my ears, nothing (except for maybe some trumpets) captures this sense of defiance triumphant as well as the electric guitar solo.

It is exuberant and loud and even disruptive (C.S. Lewis may well have called it “masculine,” in his lovably complementarian fashion). Even better, it’s a demonstration of extreme technical skill on the part of the player, harnessed and displayed not for his own glory, but for the glory of the one who gracefully created the player and (we assume) who also rejoices in the joyful noise.

Is it ideal for quiet meditation? Of course not. But all worship need not be quiet meditation, and for those times when you want to meditate loudly, then the electric guitar solo will help you do that. When you want to meditate on our calling to resist the devil, to be a light in a dark place, to cast off sin that’s been weighing you down, then the electric guitar is just what the Great Physician ordered (or, and I cannot stress this enough, some ska).

Now, the bad.

I’m So Meta Even This Acronym*

Certain modern worship songs are absurdly self-referential. We’re singing about singing. We’re singing about raising our hands (but only, as my friend James pointed out, in a purely metaphorical sense, because we look silly when our hands are raised). We’re singing, in extreme cases, about dancing. In some songs (the good ones), this is only a side-bar, almost an aside: “By the way, a proper response to the deep theological truths we are contemplating would, indeed, be praising, raising your hands, and dancing.” I have no beef with these songs, because they do actually focus on the theological truths contained within them.

But in many other songs,  the reason for this singing and (metaphorical) dancing and raising of hands is tucked away somewhere in there, but the main thing really is to be singing about singing. And in the case of When The Spirit of the Lord, it reads more like a spiritual bucket list than anything else.

When the entirety of the song is talking about worshiping, it’s easy to wonder whether the song still, in fact, qualifies as “worship” at all. After all, if I were to spend five minutes talking about “When I get that hamburger, I’m gonna eat it!”, that’s clearly not the same as actually eating…

And when taken too far, we can easily slip into…

The Ugly

Two Sundays ago, I spent five full minutes singing Swell. And, by the way, the title is not a reference to our state of being in Christ. It is, rather a reference to the motion of “the river,” which is, evidently:

• Rising
• Bringing joy, joy, joy, to my horizon
• Deep deep inside me

In response to this, I am, apparently, to let it swell. Repeatedly.

Read the lyrics. What is the river? Why is it important that this river, which is inside of me, is bringing joy to my horizon? Why is it swelling? Again, what is the river? Why should I let it “swell real deep”? Why should I let it “show in [my] feet”? And for the final time, what is the river? Can anyone tell me? Anyone?

I don’t even know what I’m praising here. The Holy Spirit? I guess? But no, can’t be the Holy Spirit, because the river is an “it.” So just the generic power of God? Maybe? And I’m praising it for “bringing joy to my horizon”?

My beef with this song isn’t that it says untrue things. It isn’t that it contains incorrect theology. It’s that this song comes incredibly, incredibly close to saying nothing at all. The concept of agreeing or disagreeing with its theology doesn’t even make sense, because it contains no theology at all.

“But you’re missing the point!” someone might say. “Just praise God, don’t worry about the specific words! Just… just let it flow, you know?” And this is, in fact, a semi-valid argument. It’s been around a long time: after all, this reasoning was even present in the early church (although then it applied to speaking in tongues). Paul’s response to this phenomenon speaks for itself:

“If I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my mind is unproductive. What should I do? I will pray with my spirit, but I will also pray with my mind. I will sing praises with my spirit, but I will also sing praises with my mind.”

1 Corinthians 14:14-15

It’s possible to sing Swell and praise God with your spirit. But I challenge you to try to worship God with your mind while singing it.

Go ahead. I’ll wait. While singing that song, try to praise with your mind as well as your spirit. Is it more difficult than worshiping while silent? Of course it is, because doing so requires you to disconnect what you’re thinking from what you’re saying!

That’s the real problem I have with some of the songs I’ve mentioned in this post. The entire purpose of corporate worship is to assist the believer in worshiping with both the spirit and the mind. But when the songs are so absurdly simplistic, even borderline meaningless, that worshiping with your mind requires you to actually block out the song itself,  that’s a huge, huge problem.

Like I said, modern worship does some things well. But it also does some things really, really terribly. To be fair, personal preference (great post by Nathan Bennett here) does play a role. But we have a problem. And the solution isn’t more cowbell.

Making Things

In what critics will soon be calling "a stunning return to form," I hope to resume using Imperfect Reflections as more than an extension of my blogs over at EO. Among other things, I'm thinking about doing a sort of "Mackenzie Uncensored" in which I can write the posts I wish I could write over at EO, but can't because "calling someone a douchebag is unprofessional," and "long, rambling intros are unnecessary" and "it really seems like you just kinda went off on a tangent here." Did I, James? Did I really?

My posts here will not be as pointed nor coherent as what goes to EO. But I'm alright with that. This is for me and whoever else wants to read what goes through my amazing head, mostly unfiltered.

I recently began working on a stained glass lampshade, using a kit that my dad bought me for my birthday/Christmas. Now, before I say anything else, I want to answer the question you're all asking yourselves right now:

Do I think that the fact that I can make stained glass makes me, in some small but meaningful way, better than someone who doesn't know how to make stained glass? Of course I do. Obviously. That's just how it is. But that's not the point.

The point is, I like making things. I've always liked making things. It 's why I used to spend hours playing with Legos, why I crafted a castle complete with lava-spewing dragon in Minecraft for no other reason than lava castle, that's why! It's why I really enjoyed painting miniatures with my friends in college (and sometimes for my friends, because they were lazy, Nathan).

I really enjoy taking a jumble of pieces and putting them together into a cohesive thing, whether it's mining stone and bucketing lava in Minecraft, building a lego spaceship complete with laser turrets mounted on turntables, or assembling stained glass. I even really enjoyed putting together my new desk and computer. I love making things.

And I inherited this love, almost entirely, from my dad.

If you've met my dad, you understand this already. If you haven't, let me break it down for you.

It'd be impossible, in this brief space, to adequately convey to you the absolutely absurd love my dad has for making things. I can't remember a time when he didn't love it, or when he wasn't good at it. From my earliest memory, my parent's house and his mother's house have been full of his creations. My parent's house contains four or five full stained-glass windows that would sell for hundreds of dollars: the result of a mere hobby. They have hanging in the house a carved, painted angel blowing a trumpet, assembled on a whim. Their front yard is dominated by a fountain assembled from rocks and an old satellite dish hand-gathered by our family. He eschews forms and pattern books, instead calling forth amazing, beautiful designs from his bald, often-hatted head. I count myself exceedingly lucky to have inherited a small portion of his amazing skill.

My dad illustrates, more than anyone else I know, the fact that being made in the image of God means being makers of things. My dad calls forth a butterfly out of shards of glass, summons an angel out of scrap-wood, and in doing so he emulates the One who crafted him out of dust. I marvel at the beautiful complexity of my dad's stained glass, and the illustrated skill of the one who crafted it, and in doing so I am reminded that the one who crafts is much more complex than his creation, and that he in turn was created by the Supreme Craftsman. And as my dad's passion and skill are evident in his stained glass, so God's passion and skill are evident in him.

So... thanks, dad. Thanks for sharing with me your love of making things. Hopefully mom can show this to you, since God apparently compensated for this incredible gift by guaranteeing you would never be able to reliably call up a particular web page.