----------------
"BRING IT BACK IN A DIFFERENT FORM"
Here's your great soap art!
Here's some other cohorts:
and HERE
are more soap art pics on Facebook !
--
Remember this?
--
Here's the backstory by the writer..
Hugh Gallagher's College App Essay:.
----
Note: If any videos don't play, click the
very left of video title
Note: If any videos don't play, click the
very left of video title
--
As Pastor/Trucker Franks suggests below, sometimes it's "more about the journey than the destination." See also "What if Torah/ מלכות השמים, is more 'journey than 'doctrine'?"
 |
| Bounded set? |
 |
| Centered set? |
 |
| Fuzzy set? |
__
--
We watched the first hour of "Drops Like Stars" by Rob Bell...will continue next week.
So far, he's covered:
So far, he's covered:
- The Art of Disruption
- The Art of Honesty
- see the rest of this art here
VIDEO VENTURE: "Drops Like Stars" part 1
----
This week, the topic is "Worshipping and Singing in Community: Psalms, Lament and Suffering"
Here is a slightly different version of part of this week's in-class presentation, filmed for an online class. It's a multipart video (6 parts, but only a half-hour total! Watch it in order) by Dave Wainscott (and a few friends) on Psalms and Lament. Watch carefully after class if you need to review and take notes, as you will be responding in the forums.
Here is a slightly different version of part of this week's in-class presentation, filmed for an online class. It's a multipart video (6 parts, but only a half-hour total! Watch it in order) by Dave Wainscott (and a few friends) on Psalms and Lament. Watch carefully after class if you need to review and take notes, as you will be responding in the forums.
Part 1 is below . Listen to the song which is part 1. Open the lyrics here, and read along as it plays. In a way, treat it like other songs (and Scriptures) we have used in this class: as a text which calls for context and your Three Worlds skills of interpretation. Do your best to discern the main characters , genre, backstory, storyline etc. (It's easier than Philemon!). But also be prepared to process how it made you feel.
part 1:
part 2:
part 3:
part 4:
part 5:
part 6: Finish with this song, which Dave prepared you for in part 5:
-
Here are some notes on the above:
-
PSALMS
PSALMS are the Jewish prayer-book that the early Christians used. What's wonderful, refreshing, honest...and sometimes disturbing (to us in the West) is that they cover the whole breadth of life and emotion. They are all technically songs and prayers.. But note how some weave in and out from a person speaking to God, God speaking to a person, a person speaking to himself. Somehow, Hebraically, holistically, it all counts as prayer.
...And as "song" Note in your Bible that several psalms have inscriptions which give the name of the tune they are to be prayed/sung to. Some seem hilarious, counterintuitive, and contradictory, but again not to a Hebrew mindset and worldview, with room for honesty, fuzzy sets and paradox:
- Psalms (click) with the line "Destroy my enemies", "break their teeth!!" ... To be sung to the tune of "Do Not Destroy" !! (Psalm 58:6)
- Psalm 22, a depressing ditty about someone in the throes of rejection despair and death. To be sung to the tune of "Doe in the Morning" ??
Psalm 137:9 "Blessed is the one who
seize yours infants and violently dashes
them against the rocks"
Remember the Bono quote:
Click here for the audio (or watch here on Youtube) of this delightful statement by Bono:
"God is interested in truth, and only in truth. And that's why God is more interested in Rock & Roll music than Gospel... Many gospel musicians can't write about what's going on in their life, because it's not allowed . they can't write about their doubt....If you can't write about what's really going on in the world and your life, because it's all happy-clappy... Is God interested in that? I mean, 'Please, don't patronize Me! I want to go the Nine-Inch-Nails gig, they're talking the truth!
-Bono
From a 2003 discussion with New York Times, more audio here
"God is interested in truth, and only in truth. And that's why God is more interested in Rock & Roll music than Gospel... Many gospel musicians can't write about what's going on in their life, because it's not allowed . they can't write about their doubt....If you can't write about what's really going on in the world and your life, because it's all happy-clappy... Is God interested in that? I mean, 'Please, don't patronize Me! I want to go the Nine-Inch-Nails gig, they're talking the truth!
-Bono
From a 2003 discussion with New York Times, more audio here
"The Jewish disciples all worshipped Jesus, and some of those worshippers doubted." (Matthew 28:17)
---------
There are several ways to categorize the psalms.
The first is the way the Bible itself does: Psalms is broken down into 5 "books" Hmm, 5...does that sound familiar? Name another book with 5 sections and suggest an answer for "Whats up with the number 5?"
Note the 5 sections are not comprised of different kinds/genres of psalms..but the styles and kinds are "randomnly"
represented throught the book..
kind of like life..
Here is one way to categorize the styles and genres:
- lament
- imprecatory
- praise
- thanksgiving
- petition
Walter Brueggemann suggests another helpful way to categorize the Psalms.
Orientation:
o Creation - in which we consider the world and our place in it
o Torah - in which we consider the importance of God's revealed will
o Wisdom - in which we consider the importance of living well
o Narrative - in which we consider our past and its influence on our present
o Psalms of Trust - in which we express our trust in God's care and goodness
q Disorientation:
o Lament - in which we/I express anger, frustration, confusion about God's (seeming?) absence
§ Communal
§ Individual
o Penitential - in which we/I express regret and sorrow over wrongs we have done
§ Communal
§ Individual
q Reorientation/New Oreientation
o Thanksgiving - in which we thank God for what God has done for us/me
§ Communal
§ Individual
o Hymns of Praise - in which we praise God for who God is
o Zion Psalms- in which we praise God for our home
o Royal Psalms - in which we consider the role of political leadership
o Covenant Renewal - in which we renew our relationship with God
-Bruggeman, source Click here.note how astonishinglyHONEST the prayer/worship book of the Jews (and Christians) is!
We'll spend some time on the "three worlds" of Psalm 22, which Jesus quotes honestly on the cross:
Here (click title below) 's a sermon on Psalm 22, which is another amazing psalm to use in a worship setting...How often have you heard "My God, My God, Why have You forsaken me?" Or "God, where were YOU when I needed you!!"
Yet how familiar is the very next psalm: 23.
Life is both Psalm 22 and 23...sometimes on the same day, in the same prayer.
If we think both/and...we think Hebrew.
Here's a link with several of the stories and illustrations I talked about tonight Iike the speaker who said "I almost didn't come tonight",,
Click the title:
"The Lord Be With You...Even When He’s Not!"
--
Jesus died naked..but not in Christian art and movies
I am not here to offend anyone unnecessarily.
But I believe Corrie Ten Boom was right and right on:
Even the (very conservative)Dallas Theological commentaries assume this, so this is not just some "liberal" agenda:
"That Jesus died naked was part of the shame which He bore for our sins. " -link
Which means this picture
(found on a blog with no credit)
is likely wrong(Jesus looks too white).
...and largely right (What Jesus is wearing).
I answered a question about this a few years ago, I would write it a bit differently know, but here it is:
First of all, it is probable that (again, contrary to nearly all artwork and movies), Jesus hung on the cross absolutely naked. This was a typical way of crucifixion, to increase the shame factor. Romans might occasionally add a loincloth type of garment as a token concession and nod to Jewish sensitivity; but not very often, it would seem. Of course, once we get past the emotive and cultural shock of imagining Jesus naked, we realize that if He indeed die naked, the symbolism is profound and prophetic: In Scripture, Jesus is called the "Second Adam". As such, it would make sense that He died "naked and unashamed." We are also told that "cursed is he who dies on a tree." The nakedness was a sign and enfolding of shame and token of curse. And the wonderful story of Corrie ten Boom and family, told in the book and movie "The Hiding Place," relates. One of the turning points of her ability to endure the Ravensbruck concentration camp, particularly the shame of walking naked past the male guards, was her conviction that Jesus too was shamed and stripped naked before guards. "Finally, it dawned on me," she preached once," that this (shaming through nakedness) happened to Jesus too..., and Jesus is my example, and now it is happening to me, then I am simply doing what Jesus did." She concluded, "I know that Jesus gave me that thought and it gave me peace. It gave me comfort and I could bear the shame and cruel treatment."
continued
continued
--
The most haunting, devastating, barely listenable (which is why I regularly listen to it, and use it as a call to prayer and honesty)song I know is by Michael Knott, madman-genius-Christian of the voluminous catalog...whether under his own name, Lifesavers Underground, LSU, Cush...
Here's the song:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Double
you're sittin' there wondering why is it like this
and the whole world's crazy and the earth is sick
and someone's yelling from the bathroom door
the toilet's overflowing on the floor
and the one by the phone
says i cannot hear
while the one by the jukebox spills his beer
and the man on the pinball hits sixteen mil
someone ducks behind the counter to pop a pill
and you reach in your pocket to see if there's more
and the biggest bill falls so you're left with four
and you're too gone to look but you still try
then you see it in the hand of a great big guy
who looks just like he'd kill you fast
and you think for a minute
you let it pass
and the stool falls over when you set back down
it bumps a mean pool shooter from across the town
he misses his shot - it's all on you
and with your last four bucks you know what you'll do
sorry man can i buy you a drink
and he shakes his head and says, make it a double
the next thing you know you wake up at home
and the little one there won't leave you alone
she's awake and hungry
she needs some potty help
and you remember what happened last time she tried it by herself
and your wife says hurry, we're late for church
and you can barely see
and your head still hurts
and the preacher starts preaching
and you feel remorse
he's got five little kids and a big divorce
and your wife looks down and says she don't know how
he's been her guiding light for ten years now
and his marriage is over, it's barely alive
and how in the world will ours ever survive?
The juxtaposing of "church"world and "real world" is too
close for comfort...and offers little; as does a pastor's divorce. The sharing and prayer
time after the stunned silence that song creates would inevitably be life-changing... BUT is this version ready for church? Note the slight (but HUGE) Lyrics change:
close for comfort...and offers little; as does a pastor's divorce. The sharing and prayer
--Once, church, we did complaints/laments colored markers on posterboard.
Photos here, click twice to read and weep...and laugh!:
But most of us do it less officially, and more often,...in prayer, even if unarticulated/wordless.
Complaints/laments/questions have to surface somewhere. So we might as well be honest andelevate them. pray them post them, sing them....prophetically write them on subway walls or church halls.
The
movement, let along the psalms of lament,
N.T. Wright on Psalms:
"some people are so wicked that we simply must wish judgment upon them"
We also did this, after a reading of Psalm 22..
We will watch this, it's on Moodle:
Sermon preached on Sunday, February 6th, by Dr. Leonard Sweet at the Marble Collegiate Church in New York City.
--------------------------------------------
--
Remember the Prodigal Son and the forgotten famine?
The big idea:
What goes without being said for us can lead us to miss important details in a Bible passage, even when the author is trying to make them obvious. Mark Allan Powell offers an excellent example of this phenomenon in “The Forgotten Famine,” an exploration of the theme of personal responsibility in what we call the parable of the prodigal son. Powell had twelve students in a seminary class read the story carefully from Luke’s Gospel, close their Bibles and then retell the story as faithfully as possible to a partner. None of the twelve American seminary students mentioned the famine in Luke 15:14, which precipitates the son’s eventual return. Powell found this omission interesting, so he organized a larger experiment in which he had one hundred people read the story and retell it, as accurately as possible, to a partner. Only six of the one hundred participants mentioned the famine. The group was ethnically, racially, socioeconomically and religiously diverse. The “famine-forgetters,” as Powell calls them, had only one thing in common: they were from the United States.
Later, Powell had the opportunity to try the experiment again, this time outside the United States. In St. Petersburg, Russia, he gathered fifty participants to read and retell the prodigal son story. This time an overwhelming forty-two of the fifty participants mentioned the famine. Why? Just seventy years before, 670,000 people had died of starvation after a Nazi German siege of the capital city began a three-year famine. Famine was very much a part of the history and imagination of the Russian participants in Powell’s exercise. Based solely on cultural location, people from America and Russia disagreed about what they considered the crucial details of the story.
Americans tend to treat the mention of the famine as an unnecessary plot device. Sure, we think: the famine makes matters worse for the young son. He’s already penniless, and now there’s no food to buy even if he did have money. But he has already committed his sin, so it goes without being said for us that the main issue in the story is his wastefulness, not the famine. This is evident from our traditional title for the story: the parable of the prodigal (“wasteful”) son. We apply the story, then, as a lesson about willful rebellion and repentance. The boy is guilty, morally, of disrespecting his father and squandering his inheritance. He must now ask for forgiveness.
Christians in other parts of the world understand the story differently. In cultures more familiar with famine, like Russia, readers consider the boy’s spending less important than the famine. The application of the story has less to do with willful rebellion and more to do with God’s faithfulness to deliver his people from hopeless situations. The boy’s problem is not that he is wasteful but that he is lost.
Our goal in this book is not, first and foremost, to argue which interpretation of a biblical story like this one is correct. Our goal is to raise this question: if our cultural context and assumptions can cause us to overlook a famine, what else do we fail to notice? link
--
PHILEMON
One theory?Philemon isn't the slaveowner at all, it is Archippus. Note: see this note in your class Bible..
Note that grammatically, the letter we call Philemon might be addressed not to the first mentioned (Philemon), but the last-mentioned (Archippus). Verse 1, 2:
To Philemon our dear friend and co-worker, to Apphia our sister,] to Archippus our fellow soldier, and to the church in your house..
See Colossians 4. Note same writer (Paul) and many similar names as the "Philemon" letter. What is the task Paul wants Archippus to fulfill? Could it be to release Onesimus?
Colossians 4.7 Tychicus will tell you all the news about me; he is a beloved brother, a faithful minister, and a fellow servant[b] in the Lord. 8 I have sent him to you for this very purpose, so that you may know how we are[c] and that he may encourage your hearts; 9 he is
coming with Onesimus, the faithful and beloved brother, who is one of you. They will tell you about everything here.
10 Aristarchus my fellow prisoner greets you, as does Mark the cousin of Barnabas, concerning whom you have received instructions—if he comes to you, welcome him. 11 And Jesus who is called Justus greets you. These are the only ones of the circumcision among my co-workers for the kingdom of God, and they have been a comfort to me. 12 Epaphras, who is one of you, a servant[d] of Christ Jesus, greets you. He is always wrestling in his prayers on your behalf, so that you may stand mature and fully assured in everything that God wills. 13 For I testify for him that he has worked hard for you and for those in Laodicea and in Hierapolis. 14 Luke, the beloved physician, and Demas greet you. 15 Give my greetings to the brothers and sisters[e] in Laodicea, and to Nympha and the church in her house. 16 And when this letter has been read among you, have it read also in the church of the Laodiceans; and see that you read also the letter from Laodicea. 17 And say to Archippus, “See that you
complete the task that you have received in the Lord.”
18 I, Paul, write this greeting with my own hand. Remember my chains. Grace be with you.[f]
----
Philemon, an allegory?
Consider the following passage (Philemon 8-18) with these analogies in mind:
- Paul (the advocate) : Jesus
- Onesmus (the guilty slave) : us (sinners)
- Philemon (the slave owner) : God the Father
Martin Luther:
"Even as Christ did for us with God the Father,
thus also St. Paul does for Onesimus with Philemon"
"Even as Christ did for us with God the Father,
thus also St. Paul does for Onesimus with Philemon"
Accordingly, though I (Paul) am bold enough in Christ to command you (Philemon) to do what is required, yet for love's sake I prefer to appeal to you—I, Paul, an old man and now a prisoner also for Christ Jesus— I appeal to you for my child, Onesimus, whose father I became in my imprisonment. (Formerly he was useless to you, but now he is indeed useful to you and to me.) I am sending him back to you, sending my very heart. I would have been glad to keep him with me, in order that he might serve me on your behalf during my imprisonment for the gospel, but I preferred to do nothing without your consent in order that your goodness might not be by compulsion but of your own free will. For this perhaps is why he was parted from you for a while, that you might have him back forever, no longer as a slave but more than a slave, as a beloved brother—especially to me, but how much more to you, both in the flesh and in the Lord.
-----------------What do you remember about this?
---
Who noticed this on the board next to four CDs, and if so, why didn't you take one?
