Monday, April 16, 2018
596 - 'Our' of Power
Spirituality Column #596
April 17, 2018
Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary
‘Our’ of Power
By Bob Walters
“… thanks be to God
who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” – Apostle Paul, 1
Corinthians 15:57
For each of
us who claims Christ as our personal, eternal savior, we must never forget that
Christianity is the ultimate team effort.
Jesus is our savior. One’s faith is dead if Jesus is considered
only “my” savior.
I thought I was onto something new
recently as I was nearing the end of reading Kenneth Bailey’s wonderful book “Paul
through Mediterranean Eyes.” It is a brilliant
dissection of the literary and rhetorical construction of 1 Corinthians and how
it is actually five exquisitely constructed separate essays made up of
individual homilies. Paul wrote 1
Corinthians with metaphors that would relate to the Corinthians (e.g. mountains,
military, sports, labor) and with philosophical and rhetorical constructions
that would resonate with both Greek and Hebrew intellectuals. There is a lot more there, I discovered, than
first meets the eye. Bailey offers
astounding insights.
Anyway, the final line in Paul’s essay
on the Resurrection (1 Corinthians 15:1-57), is the one noted above: “our Lord Jesus Christ.” Bailey’s commentary on that particular line
keyed not on thankfulness and victory, but on the word “our.” When “our” faith,
together, is focused not on me but on “our
Lord Jesus Christ,” most of the problems of any church – such as the multi-cultural
and doctrinally competing quagmire in the Corinthian church that Paul was
addressing – go away. How? Because of “our.”
Says Bailey: “If Paul’s readers can
reflect deeply on those four words [our
Lord Jesus Christ], all will be well. … Jesus is Lord in a way Caesar is not.
Let the Romans and Greeks take note.
Jesus is the Messiah (Christ);
let the Jews take note. He is our Lord, not my Lord. Together we have
one Lord and one Father.”
Bailey made such a powerful case
for the shared power we have in “our” God through Christ that the idea popped
into my head about how many New Testament prayer pronouns are in the plural (“Our Father,” “deliver us,” “give us,” etc.)
while so many Old Testament prayer pronouns are in the singular (“The Lord is my shepherd,” “Create in me a
pure heart,” “expand my territory,”
“the Lord is my strength,” etc.).
My runaway brain fast-forwarded to
the community of the Father-Son-Spirit Trinity of the New Testament vs. the
more singular-appearing God of the Old.
And isn’t it interesting how Jesus uniquely provides us a personal
relationship with God in faith while the Old Testament covenant is with all of
Israel in common obedience to the Law?
Had I landed on the cusp of some new plural vs. singular prayerful covenantal
insight?
Visiting with my friend and mentor
theologian George Bebawi last week, He said no, that’s nothing new and really
not even a “thing.” He pointed out that
most of the Psalms reflect personal experiences and I was seeing things that
weren’t really there.
Much, I would suppose, as did many
in the Corinthian church. Mea Culpa.
Walters
(rlwcom@aol.com) appreciates the power of our faith
together, the correction of the occasional comparatively neophyte error (mine),
and prays for George who is in the hospital sorting out a chronic heart/kidney
ailment.
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