Why Does Theology Matter? 3. Theology: Why Some Theologies Are Good And Others Not So Much.

Transcription

1 Why Does Theology Matter? 3. Theology: Why Some Theologies Are Good And Others Not So Much. Julian A. Davies The University Church Toledo, Ohio 43615

2 Theology: Why Some Theologies Are Good And Others Not So Much. Surely, the last thing we want is

3 A theology that limits our relationship with God

4 A theology that limits our relationship with others

5 A theology that tries to force God into a box of our own making

6 While, at the same time, remembering the wisdom of Snoopy

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8 What we mean by theology that is not so good?

9 Sometimes, saying what is not can help us narrow down what is! Via negativa Using our earlier example of building a Biblical theology to help complete the sentence, God is we can exclude various possibilities by saying what God is not!

10 For example: God is not a man Numbers 23:19a

11 For example: God is not the author of confusion, but of peace 1 Corinthians 14:33

12 For example: God is not the God of the dead, but of the living. Matthew 22:32b

13 What s wrong and what s not? Via negativa Via positiva

14 Using a Via Negativa Salvation By Faith John Wesley Preached at St. Mary's Oxford, before the university, on June 18, 1738 "By grace are ye saved through faith." Ephesians 2.8

15 First question asked: What faith it is through which we are saved? If someone said that this faith is in: 1. The being and attributes of God. 2. A future state of reward and punishment. 3. The obligatory nature of moral virtue. Would that be a good description of the faith through which we are saved?

16 First question asked: Wesley says no! this is barely the faith of a heathen. [In other words, these things should be obvious and self evident to all people]

17 What faith it is through which we are saved? If someone said that this faith is in: 1. A wise and powerful God 2. A God gracious to reward, and just to punish 3. Jesus as the Son of God 4. Jesus as the Christ 5. Jesus as the Savior of the world. Would that be a good description of the faith through which we are saved?

18 What faith it is through which we are saved? Wesley says no! Thus far goeth the faith of a devil. [The Biblical narrative has the devil and agents of the devil proclaim all of these things!]

19 If someone said that this faith is : 1. Sufficient to "leave all and follow him 2. Enough for the power to work miracles, to "heal all manner of sickness, and all manner of disease" 3. Sufficient for "power and authority over all devils 4. Motivation enough to "preach the kingdom of God." Would that be a good description of the faith through which we are saved?

20 What faith it is through which we are saved? Wesley says no! This faith is barely that which the Apostles themselves had while Christ was yet upon earth. [And as Christ no longer physically walks alongside us, our faith must exceed that of the Apostles]

21 Wesley s Via Negativa What faith it is through which we are saved? It is not the faith of a heathen It is not the faith of the devil It is not the faith of the Apostles So what is it?

22 Wesley s Via Positiva What faith it is through which we are saved? in general, it is a faith in Christ: Christ, and God through Christ And therefore, it is sufficiently, absolutely distinguished from the faith either of ancient or modern heathens.

23 Wesley s Via Positiva What faith it is through which we are saved? And from the faith of a devil it is fully distinguished by this: it is not barely a speculative, rational thing, a cold, lifeless assent, a train of ideas in the head; but also a disposition of the heart. And herein does it differ from that faith which the Apostles themselves had while our Lord was on earth, that it acknowledges the necessity and merit of his death, and the power of his resurrection.

24 Wesley s Via Positiva What faith it is through which we are saved? Christian faith is then, not only an assent to the whole gospel of Christ, but also a full reliance on the blood of Christ; a trust in the merits of his life, death, and resurrection; a recumbency upon him as our atonement and our life, as given for us, and living in us; and, in consequence hereof, a closing with him, and cleaving to him, as our "wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption," or, in one word, our salvation.

25 Wesley s theological strategy Via negativa Via positiva

26 Pulling together ideas to examine a vexing question about salvation Worldview Biblical theology Lists of attributes Limits of knowledge Via Positiva/Via Negativa

27 The world today

28 What about this situation? Judaism 14 million Islam 1.3 billion Buddhism 376 million Hinduism 900 million Christianity 2.1 billion Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist: 1.1 billion Chinese traditional religion: 394 million Primal-indigenous: 300 million African Traditional & Diasporic: 100 million Sikhism: 23 million Juche: 19 million

29 What about this situation? Spiritism: 15 million Baha'i: 7 million Jainism: 4.2 million Shinto: 4 million Cao Dai: 4 million Zoroastrianism: 2.6 million Tenrikyo: 2 million Neo-Paganism: 1 million Unitarian-Universalism: 800 thousand Rastafarianism: 600 thousand Scientology: 500 thousand

30 A Bifurcated Continuum Of Positions My way or the highway 2 I m right but you re not entirely wrong 3 Its all good 4 None of it matters 3

31 Imagine Potential Pathways to God GOD

32 Position 1: One Pathway X X X GOD X X X X

33 Position One: One Pathway There is one true religion and all others are simply wrong. There is one exclusive path to salvation. John 14:6 - I am the way, the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father except through me Outside the church, no salvation [Note that Judaism always held in tension the covenants with Noah and with Moses and never saw salvation as restricted solely to the Jews. And Jesus was a Jew.]

34 Position Two: One Best Pathway GOD

35 Position Two: One Best Pathway One true religion - other religions contain elements of truth. Many paths, one norm. God is at work in all traditions, which are genuine responses to God and true paths of salvation for adherents, despite their limitations. Just as there are prefigurations of Christ in the Hebrew Scriptures, so there are similar prefigurations in other religions.

36 Position Two: One Best Pathway Often known as the hidden Christ or the anonymous Christ, these prefigurations show that there are many paths, but only one norm. Acts 17:22-28 Then Paul stood in front of the Areopagus and said, Athenians, I see how extremely religious you are in every way. For as I went through the city and looked carefully at the objects of your worship

37 Position Two: One Best Pathway I found among them an altar with the inscription, To an unknown god. What therefore you worship as unknown, this I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and everything in it, he who is Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in shrines made by human hands, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mortals life and breath and all things. From one ancestor he made all nations to inhabit the whole earth, and he allotted the times of their existence and the boundaries of the places

38 Position Two: One Best Pathway where they would live, so that they would search for God and perhaps grope for him and find him though indeed he is not far from each one of us. For In him we live and move and have our being ; as even some of your own poets have said, For we too are his offspring.

39 Position Three: It s All Good (i.e. Religions Are Expressions Of Culture)???? GOD????

40 Position Three: Religions Are Expressions Of Culture Essentially all religions involve similar ideas. Each culture expresses its sense of religion differently. There is no neutral ground on which to stand in order to compare one with another. Ecclesiastes 1:2 Vanity of vanities, says the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity.

41 Position Three: Religions Are Expressions Of Culture All religions are fundamentally the same but expressed in differing cultural forms. The common core of belief is expressed in culturally-conditioned doctrinal statements in each religion. Religions share such attributes as (i) a sense of the mystical, (ii) a sense of the unity of creation, (iii) a sense of dependence of something beyond the self, (iv) a sense of the numinous power of the holy.and so on.

42 Position Three: Religions Are Expressions Of Culture These common attributes are expressed through the culture in which adherents are embedded through doctrine. The paths to salvation are essentially equivalent. Genesis 17: As for Ishmael, I have heard you; I will bless him and make him fruitful and exceedingly numerous; he shall be the father of twelve princes, and I will make him a great nation.

43 Position Four: It Is All Meaningless???? Blah, blah, blah

44 Position Four: It Is All Meaningless All religions are fundamentally meaningless and express the need of humankind for structure and security through psychological projection of an imaginary god. Ludwig Feuerbach wrote that God is a projection of man s inner needs and wishes and is therefore an illusion.

45 Position Four: It Is All Meaningless Sigmund Freud ( among all the philosophers I worship and admire [Feuerbach] the most ) believed that religion was childish and that humankind would eventually outgrow it. He saw the need for an all-powerful father figure as a neurosis, God is psychologically nothing other than an exalted father.

46 A Bifurcated Continuum Of Positions My way or the highway 2 I m right but you re not entirely wrong 3 Its all good 4 None of it matters 3

47 Thinking about our list Ways of talking about God God is truth God is love God is merciful God is jealous God is faithful God is gracious God is great God is holy Which comes top of the list?

48 Top of the List Rob Bell (in Love Wins ) asks what things would look like if love is at the top of the list

49 Top of the List Karl Barth saw God as characterized by freedom. So, we can never impose limits on the scope of God s grace; and we can never impose a universalist system on grace as we would be compromising the freedom of grace - presuming to define the exact scope of God s freedom.

50 Top of the List Karl Barth: The proclamation of the Church must make allowance for this freedom of grace for a grace which automatically would ultimately have to embrace each and every one would certainly not be free grace

51 Top of the List It surely would not be God s grace. But would it be God s free grace if we could absolutely deny that it could do that? [Thus] the freedom of grace is preserved on both these sides. Barth, God Here and Now, pp

52 Taking a Step Back.. Barth protests both against a system of universalism and against a denial of universalism. If God acts in freedom, then we can neither deny nor affirm the possibility of universal salvation.

53 Taking a Step Back.. What is top of the list? Love? Freedom? Something else? Maybe it is hope the hope that in the end it will all work out

54 In the Wesleyan/Methodist Tradition As United Methodist Christians reflect anew on our faith we rediscover that God who has acted in Jesus Christ for the salvation of the whole world, is also Creator of all humankind, the one God and father of all, who is Lord of all, works through all, and is in all (Ephesians 4:6 TEV). [We] trust that because of what we know of God in Jesus, God deals graciously and lovingly with all people, everywhere. UM Book of Resolutions, 2004 p. 255.

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56 As we conclude Any questions?