tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37106751.post408427813365047689..comments2023-06-28T11:56:24.073-04:00Comments on The Lamb's War: Resurrection Without the Cross is DeadMicah Baleshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06849915973708989620noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37106751.post-58761193229942481142012-04-13T03:57:16.189-04:002012-04-13T03:57:16.189-04:00It seems to me that there is an overemphasis on th...It seems to me that there is an overemphasis on the execution and an indifference to the resurrection in most Christian churches. I guess this is because of the importance many place on their theories of the atonement, which to me is of much lesser importance than believing 'He IS Alive!'.<br /><br />The crucifixion was not a unique event. It wasn't even (sadly) the worst way humans have invented to kill others. The power is not in thinking too deeply about the Passion (in my view) but in thinking that this was the inevitable encapsulation of the incarnation. If we want to be close to God, The Way is sacrifice not power and 'winning'. Here is a man who was closer to God than anyone has ever been (because he actually was God..) and that sacrifice led to his death. To be overcome by the importance of his death seems to miss the point if it does not also lead us to sacrifice ourselves.<br /><br />I believe in Jesus Christ: his life, death and resurrection.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37106751.post-8900847570597569972012-04-06T13:51:48.548-04:002012-04-06T13:51:48.548-04:00This is very helpful ministry, Friend. My heart is...This is very helpful ministry, Friend. My heart is with you and your travel-mates as you sojourn out to Barnesville today. I will think of it as a moving worship service you are having in the car together (you checking into your smartphone from time to time!)<br /><br />Seeing the whole flow of the drama of "Holy Week" -- "the Passion of Christ" -- is vital. You have highlighted those connections, and I am grateful. There is no sugar-coating the brutality and obscenity of crucifixion, or any death-by-torture. While I value that Protestants have an empty cross rather than showing a writhing Jesus, it may make it too easy for us to simply affirm that "He is Risen" without the abysmal loss that his friends and family experienced, in seeing him die. Is it any wonder that they went into hiding?<br /><br />My mind does, however, jump ahead to the delightful story of how the women were the first to bring the good news on Sunday to the demoralized and skeptical small band of men. It speaks to the incredulity which all of us may have, when looking at the dynamics of death, and how difficult it may be to accept that, in God's Economy, Life may yet triumph over Death.<br /><br />While I share in the general Quaker reluctance to have an "observance of days," I also think it is fitting for us to join with the rest of the Christian world in pondering these elemental motifs -- premature triumph (Palm Sunday), fellowship and instruction around The Table (Last Supper-Seder), abandonment and betrayal (Gethsemani), witness to Truth in the face of seemingly all-powerful secular authority (trial before Pilate), deliberate and sadistic infliction of lethal punishment ("Good Friday"), an indeterminate time of unknowing (Saturday), and then the mystery of something fundamentally New breaking forth, overcoming the bonds of death -- however we experience that: historically or existentially.<br /><br />In the history of the Church, however, it doesn't all end with the Resurrection or Ascension -- events on which there is no historical evidence. It does, however, really start to come together and take off and form a New Beginning in the event of Pentecost, when a variety of people experience an inbreaking of a Power that is still with us, and overcomes our demographic/sociological distinctions. That reality of a Church Universal is tangible and still with us. <br /><br />I delight in saying that the miracle of Pentecost isn't that people spoke in tongues, but that they understood other tongues. May that be our current testimony as well -- alive with God's Spirit, understood in Jesus as our Messiah.<br /><br />Love to all who read this, -DHFDavid H. Finkehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07817925960778922467noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37106751.post-53709547160297448572012-04-06T13:11:29.774-04:002012-04-06T13:11:29.774-04:00amen.amen.The Future of the Republic https://www.blogger.com/profile/00330796105191290424noreply@blogger.com