Views on Penal Substitution and Gay Marriage

What do you think of my Venn diagramme below?

Am I right to suggest that there is a tendency for those who object to Penal Substitution to support gay marriage?

Am I right to suggest that there is a tendency for those for who Penal substitution is the indispensable truth, to oppose gay marriage?

Am I wrong to generalise, or is it a reasonable overview?

Is it that if you think God’s laws (in detail) are important, it means that (a) they must be obeyed even when culturally inconvenient and (b) there must be punishment for breach of those laws and hence the need for penal substitution as the only way to satisfy both justice and mercy simultaneously?

Is it that if you are fuzzy about the laws, then the need for punishment can be glossed over and more appealing interpretations of the cross can be found?

Can we bring left and right together, making the right less harsh and the left less lax?

Work ethic

Hey, I have done some real work today!

What we learn from Sapho, the Greek Poet.

I was listening to Melvyn Bragg’s “in Our Time” on Radio 4 this morning. Yes, this means I am officially middle aged! (For readers not familiar with the programme, Melvyn gathers a group, usually university professors, and they discuss something highly intellectual and academic like the Cynics movement in ancient Greece, the development of Anarchist philosophy, etc)

This time the erudite discussion was about Roman and Greek poetry and how it addresses the subject of love.

A key figure in moving poetry away from epics like the Iliad to this more day to day topic was the Greek poet Sapho. It is from Sapho, the first famous female poet, that we get our language of love today.

They were saying that many of her poems were love triangles; she is watching the person she loves being chatted up by a rival, and describes her turmoil as this happens.

I found out this morning from the programme that Sapho was a lesbian, and in fact the object of her love in the love triangle was often a woman, being chatted up by a hunky man.

The discussion moved on to Roman poetry, and apparently one of the Roman poets whose name escapes me (it had a C in it, and he was related to Julius Ceaser and to Lesbia), more or less copied some of Sapho’s work but as well as translating it to Latin he swapped the gender’s of the parties, so now he was watching a woman getting frisky with his boyfriend. The poet’s relative Lesbia was attached to the Greek island Lesbos and the lesbian group there, from which Lesbianism gets its name.

So why am I writing all this stuff here? Because you will be aware that I have already written some posts on the topic of homosexuality and how to interpret the Apostle Paul’s writings on the topic. I have been genuinely seaching for the truth, trying to do so with an open mind and to lay down my prejudices.

According to the Church of England newspaper, Bishop Ingham has stated that ‘arsenokoitai’ refers not to adult consenting homosexual relationships, but to pederasty, and that the modern concept of homosexual love was virtually unknown at the time.

It is clear from the scholar’s discussion of Sappho, the Roman Poet, etc, that in fact the concept of homosexual love was not only known but was socially acceptable. Not as a marriage, because marriage was for raising babies not for sexual pleasure. You wouldn’t subject your wife to your lust, you would satisfy that elsewhere.

So that is the context into which Paul was writing.

And having wondered about this topic for some time in a genuine search for the truth, I now consider that Bishop Ingham’s bluff has been called. I am now convinced that Paul, in writing ‘arsenokoitai’ was writing about men who sleep with men (in the sexual sense).

And in as much as homosexual love was known and accepted by the Greek society but Paul called the church OUT of that society, so in today’s society when homosexual love is known and accepted the call to us all including homosexual people today is the same. Come out of that society, and into the Kingdom of God. “For such some of you were”. If we continue to act that way, we will not inherit the kingdom. I want to share the Kingdom with homosexual people. This is the path given by God through Paul.

"Roman Catholic" is an oxymoron.

(Title says it all)/

Business website

I have set one up.

Not telling you, though, since this is supposed to be an anonymous blog.

Work ethic

I have sat here for the last 8 hours of working time, doing virtually nothing related to what I am being paid to sit here doing.

One reason for this is distraction – it is always more interesting to surf blogs than to work out water levels in a sewage tank.

Another reason is that I am finding hard to get my teeth into anything. Most of my projects are waiting for someone else to do something. I could make an assumption about what they will do, but it could all be abortive. I don’t really know what I am supposed to be doing.

Another reason is that often it’s not that there is nothing to do; it’s that I can’t think what it is. And I know that whatever it is, I will be in trouble for not doing.

So for distractions, workload fluctuations, and poor foresight, I do zilch. And I get to the end of the day feeling demotivated, and feeling guilty because I am still taking the clients money for doing nothing. It is contrary to my personal work ethic to sit at my desk inactive in this way.

These days contrast sharply with other days when as soon as I walk in people are asking me questions and requiring output from me, I have clear vision and I have the information and tools to hand – I soar through the day and go home knackered, but satisfied. When I’m good, I’m very good.

I want more good days, and fewer confused ones.

New business

Apparently the wheels are turning and my business bank account may be open in the next ten days, and then I can offically start trading as a freelance engineer.

Vestments on trial

I returned briefly to my placement church last night for Sunday evensong.

Well, if I am more honest, I went to see if I could borrow a cassock and surplice for my licensing next week [since I will wear them too rarely to purchase].

Coming home, it dawned on me that none of my family had ever seen me in robes. I guessed that they might find it amusing and even have a bit of a laugh, and decided that I should get this over and done with by modelling them at home, rather than have them burst out laughing at their Dad as I process up the aisle on Saturday.

Well, it’s a good thing I did. Child 3 has only two modes: Adoration of what he sees as cool (eg shiny football boots), and extreme mockery of what he sees as rubbish (eg anything unrelated to football). So I had to endure shrieks of laughter and ridicule from him. Next was Child 4 – more laughter. Child 5 “Dad, you look like a girl. Shall I get a ribbon for your hair?” Child 6 – ditto. Child 2 – normally the most respectful – “Face up to it Dad, you look really stupid”. Child 1 was shut in his study revising for exams. I opened the door and he looked at me for a fraction of a second then let out a long high pitched scream.

I turned to my wife for comfort – mistake. She was very much on their side.

So, I was glad to have got it over and done with, but it was worse than I expected and quite disappointing as I expected at least my some of own family would be more supportive and encouraging.

Worse, earlier in the day I had dropped off tickets for the event at my brother’s house. We live in the same town but our paths rarely cross in the business of life and I haven’t actually seen him for two years. His first words “Good to see you”? No such luck … “My goodness, you’ve aged!”

Well so has he but I’m too polite to say.

So I moaned to my parents about this on the phone. And they agreed with him, saying I look older than he does (and he is 5 years my senior). They blamed my former vasectomy – though I actually started going grey when my daughter was in hospital and the doctor thought she was dieing.

So, shall I abandon my family and go and live in a monastery somewhere?

Mortgage woes

Found out today that I have been refused the mortage to do up the basement so that my kids don't have to sleep next to mouldy walls. So - big family needs big house needs big mortgage refused because of big family. But if i had a small family i wouldn't need the big house and wouldn't be asking for a mortgage, would I?

In the meantime, rates are going up. I will have to act fast to try a diffferent route.

Licensing news

Just over a week till my licensing.

The in-house magazine at this office has a social slot, so I put an articel in it about my licensing, the course, etc. This has raised some discusion with colleagues (which is why i put it in).

Of course some cynics say that I should have had a photo of me bashing someone with a giant crucifix.

Others have had more general questions - can you do weddings? Can you do funerals?

But the lad next to me has just had a long chat about faith, proof, healing, tongues (i gave him the spectrum of theological views) etc. So hopefully this will have planted and/or watered enough seed to spring into a living faith in him too. Please pray for him.

Tax morality

I am now supposed to be glorying in my new role as director of my own company. However, life never runs smooth. In view of changes to the tax regime there have been huge numbers of people doing just the same, and this means that my company's bank, which should have foreseen the problem, can't cope with 18,000 simultaneous applications for new business accounts from people like me.

So I am still being paid through the old system subject to the new tax regime and paying far more than i should. AAARRRGGH. [Some of my colleagues are in a worse situation, having been abandoned by their respective partners and not getting paid at all.]

But all this raises questions. The tax regime has changed to stop people abusing the old system. Was i abusing the old system? Is it moral for a Christian to seek out the most 'tax-efficient' arrangement? Should he not willingly pay extra into the state which guarantees his welfare? Great theory, but little comfort when I have 6 kids and a mortgage.

Penal substitution (2)

OK - it was a long blog - in fact it counts as a rant: long and disorganised. But I stand by the main points.

Penal substitution

I don't have time for a big theology blog right now.

But in summary - there are many valid ways to think of the mystery of the cross and we don't understand any of them fully enough to say with absolute certainty what their relative merits are. What is certain is that none tell the whole story, and need oters to fill in the gaps. Of the many approaches, Penal Substitution is ingrained in the scriptures from cover to cover. Over the last few days I have read a lot of comments and objections to it, and many of them wrongly think it is a new invention, many wrongly think it implies divine child abuse, many wrongly think it is a new invention. They all forget that God is a just God, and cannot let sin be unpunished without compromising that justice. Faced with the dilemma of punishing his own creation, he takes responibility for it by hiding the sinner in himself so that he becomes sin and takes on himself the punishment.

This moves on to the mystery that really blows my mind....that the main punishment for sin is [death of course, but within death it is...] separation from God. So God takes on himself, separation from himself. And so to draw attention to this Jesus on the cross cries out "Why have you forsaken me?"... not becasue he doesn't know but becasue he wants us to think about it. Get your head around this - a division in the Trinity?!?! No wonder the earth shook and the sun went dark! What a cataclysmic event!

The Father was still with the Son in the sense that he is omnipresent and continues to run affairs associated with the crucifixion and beyond, but for that time Jesus took on himself MY separation from God. What a cost for our God - to be separated from yourself after an eternity of union!

After filtering the dross of objections to PS that are based on total misconceptions of it, there were two that made me stop and think.

One is that PS does not explain the resurrection. Well, like I said above, none of the explanations can stand on its own. But thought of in terms of this separation, although the task of penal substitution does not require resurrection, it does make sense for the divided trinity to re-converge and resurrection makes sense as a mechanism for that to take place.

The next best objection was that God will not aquit the guilty or punish the innocent (there is a Bible verse that says so), and this seems to contradict substitution. But like I said, the sinner is in Christ, and Christ becomes sin: Christ though innocent becomes guilty on our behalf. the nearest analogy, poor though it is, is when [in the UK] a junior engineer makes a mistake on site resulting in an injury accident, and the boss of his company gets sent to prison. The Junior engineer is 'in' the boss - the boss takes responsibility for his staff's mistakes even though he himself is innocent.

And so I thank God, because althoughI had broken his law, and owed him my life, he took me into himself and took on himslef responsibility for that debt. And so now, I am not separated from God, but join with Christ in union with him forever. HALLELUJAH!

A final word to those who think it is a new idea - the real new, twentieth century, idea is that God is somehow too nice and cuddly to actually get angry, and too soft to implement his own promises of judgement. Get real, and go and read the scriptures! "Woe to those who say 'Peace, peace', when there is no peace!"

Marriage difficulties

Not my own; my friends'. But that is scary, and my experiences are not always transferabe...his wife is not my wife and reacts differently. i can't really talk about it here. But please pray for christians with marriage problems - the devil loves to attack in this way.

Mad PC

So it is OK in the UK for women to claim they are better drivers and get cheaper insurance. they can also have ladies only taxi services, a ladies only women's institute etc etc etc.

But think of the outcry and shouts of injustice and demands for equality if you were to substitute the word "men" for "women" in those sentances!

Christian Calendar

I have always been brought up with a non-conformist view that much of the so called Christian calendar revolves around the Christianisation of pagan festivals. As Christianity expanded and pagans were converted, they needed a substitute for their pagan days, and something to celebrate when their still-pagan friends were having fun and revelry. I thought that the church took the pagan festivals and applied Christian meanings to them. My parents took a quasi- Jehovah’s Witness position that we really shouldn’t do these things at all, but I have moved away from it saying that the Kingdom of God is advancing and taking ground form the Kingdom of darkness, and I’m not going to let the Devil keep any of it, least of all the fun bits. However, this weekend, while reading the Church of England newspaper, my position has changed again. It was an article regarding the dating of Christmas, which pointed out that neither the winter solstice (21 Dec) nor the Roman Saturnalia (17 Dec) fall on December 25th. The article went on to say that the date of Christmas was derived very early, and was based on an idea prevalent at the time that the OT prophets died on their birthdays. Therefore, having evaluated the date of the crucifixion to be 25th of March, Jesus would also have been born on 25th of March. But since Jesus was a special case. It was his incarnation ie conception that was counted, rather than emergence form the womb. Thus, 9 months later, he was born on 25th December. Now I still think that the fundamental premise about the prophets dying on their birthdays is almost certainly flawed, but it is good to know that the date of Christmas was set based on theological thought rather than simply adopting a pagan festival.

Small World

On the beach I randomly met an old friend. The tide was coming in threatening a pile of shoes left by another family on the beach. I warned them about the danger – it turned out to be my former project manager who was a Rivers and Coastal engineer…and I was lecturing him about the tide coming in! As well as being my former manager he was also a college friend, a keen Muslim with whom I had had extensive theological debates. We swapped a Bible for a Quran. He is now the chief executive of a major Islamic institution in the UK. So it was good to catch up and remind him that some Christians are OK.

Back from Holiday

Back from a fantastic holiday. Based in a caravan at Silloth, Cumbria, but did a range of things – swimming in the pool in the morning, then going to a beach, a lake, a mountain, a town, a shop, a castle, or combinations of several of these, in the afternoons. Great stuff. The only difficulty was attempting to conceive in a wobbly caravan without anyone suspecting!

Easter

I am away on Holiday for a week, so you can all have a break from me adding irritating comments to your blogs.

What does Easter mean to us?

I have never really been one for celebrating the church calendar. In the 1980s My Aunt once called me "Godless" because my church at that time didn't have a service on Good Friday. In turn I diapproved of her attention to such ritualism with its 'pagan' connotations. I am happy to sing about the Incarnation (Christmas carols) in summer. The death and resuurection of Christ is of equal importance to me throughout the year - it is not less important in winter than spring. I tend to see the faith in terms of lifestyle, holiness, witness, walk with God etc, which are not measured in terms of days of the week or year any more than you can measure sound with a theodolite.

However, as part of my training and particlarly through reading Kyle's 'Vindicated' blog, I have come to appreciate the value of a calendar, re-enacting the faith, as a form of witness. And Easter does have important cultural links to the wider society to help us present the message of the cross. also, although I very much doubt that Jesus was born on 25th December, Easter does have some chronological relevance to the events it commemorates.

So, we don't want to be enslaved by a calendar (Gal 4v9-10), but we are perfectly entitled to use one where appropriate and desirable (Rom 14 v5-7).

Therefore, whether you celebrate your freedom in Christ by spending time with your family or by vestments and insence in a decorated church, I pray that you will both experience and share the blessing of being found in Christ at this time.

Arthritis

Mrs has struggled with her arthritis recently. Trying to get pregnant measn she can't take her normal pills, and the cycle of miscarriages stimulates the arthritis (as does the stress). So she can't sleep at night with pain and discomfort, and then can't get out of bed in the morning, and so she missed church (and the horse) today.

Basically, she is really down, frightened of what is happening to her, and not at all sure of her faith or of our vision for a baby. Yet what else does she have in life?

Horsing around

Not quite the usual thing at church this morning. We had a "special guest" - that is to say that the side fire escape was opened and they brought in a pony. This was the nearest they could get to a donkey! So this creature was paraded at the front for a couple of minutes, and was then lead down the central aisle and out of the front door, and the congregation was asked to follow it. So we all ended up in he church yard, which opens directly onto the main street of our town, and we finished off the service by singing hosanna, standing in a circle around the horse. This passes for a beginning of evangelism - getting the church our of the door and into the community.

It's just that the community is now convinced we are sect of horse-worshippers!