Episode Transcript
Speaker 1 00:00:06 Welcome to That Makes Total Sense, a podcast dedicated to exploring God's generosity and justice. I'm Alexis Busi, a Christian aiming to ask good questions and encouraging you to do the same. Every one of us is wired by God to live out generosity and justice. But the how sometimes eludes us that makes total sense is a way for us to get together, posture ourselves as learners, and challenge one another, to practice generosity and justice in a tangible way every day.
Speaker 1 00:00:42 Okay. Colin, this is really weird for me. <laugh>. Yes. This is like, I think it's one of the only, it may be the only, I, we were 200 something episodes in most of them have been guests, and most people I only have met virtually. You know, we started in the fall of 2019. And so even like repeat guests, um, I've only met there. I, I've had a couple of personal friends on, one is long distance, we recorded via Zoom one. She actually came over, Seth set up two mics and we did it, but I don't know, I was like, have we ever like talked to each other virtually?
Speaker 2 00:01:23 No, I don't think so. Just in the hallways and in person and, yeah. So this is a, I
Speaker 1 00:01:29 Don't, this is weird,
Speaker 2 00:01:30 Exceptional. This
Speaker 1 00:01:32 Is weird. You're like a, a little, a little rectangle, which is how I'm used to seeing normal, like, you know, guest normally, and then for you it's the complete opposite. So anyway, I had to throw that out to say, this is weird, and I'm gonna like, I'm gonna like try to be like, oh my goodness. Anyway, so <laugh> my friend Colin Cornell, who I work with and know from Fuller, which is a, a new position for you. Yes. So congrats again on that. Thank you. Um, has written books and edited books and has been on other podcasts. So Theology nerds will, like, recognize him. Have probably heard him. I heard him on, on Script and it was great. Um, but today we're gonna discuss a journal that has been accepted, but has not been published yet. So I'm, I'm feeling this temptation to say this is hot off the presses. It's hot off my printer in my office, <laugh>, but it's, but it hasn't even been printed yet, so this is pretty cool.
Speaker 2 00:02:25 Yes, yes. No, it's hot off my brain as well. Um, which is kind of unique, uh, because as you might know from academic publishing process, things can move at a pretty glacial pace so that by the time something actually emerges, uh, for public readership, it's, it's oftentimes quite distant from the moment of creativity and insight and, you know, pondering that generated it, not so in this case,
Speaker 1 00:02:48 This is really, yeah, this is really cool. So thanks for sending it over. Thanks for the opportunity to chat about this work with you before it gets out into the public. Um, and, and I wanna say that your, your position at Fuller is a professor of Bible and Mission, right? Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And so I'm like mm-hmm. <affirmative>. For some who are familiar with the seminary world, this might feel like kind of a, a unicorn ish kind of, uh, title, but can you just kind of like say, what's your mo in this? Because, uh, many people may have heard of you as a, as a biblical scholar and like, you know, Hebrew writings and things like this, but, you know, familiarity with Yahweh and, but, but how is this connected your Bible work as a, as an academic connected to mission for you?
Speaker 2 00:03:37 Yeah. What a question. Um, it is definitely a unicorn position. I think actually for a lot of folks who, uh, don't necessarily travel as much in academic circles, this feels like two subjects that are complimentary and that hang together pretty well, Bible and Mission. But if you're familiar with how tracked theological disciplines are, uh, bringing those two together is, uh, kind of covering a really, uh, unusual amount of, uh, ground. Uh, and so yeah, it's definitely a unicorn, and you're right. Um, that, uh, a few people out there might know of me from scholarly works on Hebrew Bible proper and on history, history of religions and stuff, elephantine fans out there, all two or three of them. Um, and age
Speaker 1 00:04:25 Duty, I live with one. I didn't know it. So,
Speaker 2 00:04:27 <laugh>, hey, well, I'm all I, that really does, uh, give me joy to, to hear that. Um, yes. Uh, but mission is maybe less directly, um, visible right off the page of, uh, of my resume. But I think it represents, um, an act of discernment on the part of Fuller to see that I've written a lot, uh, in more theological areas. So talking about scholars who have, for example, uh, uh, resisted, um, so totalitarianism and fascism I've written in environmental and ecological modes. Um, and so putting that together, that, that falls under that heading of mission. Um, but I'll say for me, what it means and relevant to today's conversation, I think is that very specific area of writing that addresses how the Bible informs our work of following God out into what God is doing in the world. And so there's actually a sort of specific genre of literature that does that. Um, a few of the better known authors in that Bailey Wick might be, uh, Christopher, j h Wright, uh, who's the principal figure in the article that you read, Alexis, uh, but also Michael Goheen, um, Walter Kaiser, an older, uh, generation, um, and, uh, and more, more like them, uh, in that area. So I'm very excited myself to engage more directly, uh, with that literature, um, uh, somewhat out of a sense that I am not excited about all of it and think that we might do better, uh, in certain regards. Yeah,
Speaker 1 00:06:13 I think, yeah, I think that, I think that you're right. I think it's, it's actually kind of interesting for me as I trace my interaction with the, um, kind of the, the, the, the consequences maybe of some of those, uh, the works of those authors that you name. Because I grew up in the Bible Belt and in an SS b c church for, you know, my whole, um, my whole upbringing. And I never in that setting, I would say probably because the S B C I feel kind of has its own language when it comes to a lot of that kind of stuff. But this kind of explicit, um, uh, act of God or act throughout, um, you know, creation to consummation kind of thing wasn't ever really spelled out for me in my upbringing. It looked a lot different when I got to college and started interacting more with other evangelical groups. Then I started to see it more. Um, I saw it in some of my mainline experience as well. Um, and then I kind of thought, oh my goodness, I'm the dummy in the room because I had no idea this was a thing, <laugh>, right? <laugh>. Like, you see these pictures, like this diagram that you have from Right. And I'm like, I didn't know that was a thing.
Speaker 2 00:07:27 Yes, yes. And that's why I think it's actually, if I, it's, I have very similar sort of experience, uh, with, with that, that, uh, in my case, I'll just speak for myself. You know, I think I, my upbringing did a great job of familiarizing me with the bits and bobs, the little piece pieces of scripture all over the place, not so much of having any good, clear picture of what a specific gospel text or, you know, epistle or sub collection within, uh, the canon does. And even less so of this overarching grand unified theory of the Bible or mission in the Bible. And that's why those works by those authors I named, uh, I think are really powerful for people because they kind of put the pieces all together, hang it along a clear, discernible backbone, and that's, uh, a real gift for a lot of people and helps 'em to organize their Christian lives. I'll also say there's not that much of an alternative out there that once you start thinking in this direction of the Bible as a grand storyline, the, uh, a single drama, um, God's mission as the sort of running thread through all the scripture, that there, there kind of is this one single paradigm that these various authors articulate. Uh, and nothing, nothing really yet that's, that's a at least an alternative within reach of a lot of, um, practitioners.
Speaker 1 00:08:46 Yeah. Say, say more about, about that piece, because I have found, like, as you named that, I'm like, yes, but when I became aware of it, then all of a sudden, um, you know, because we, because we think in patterns and categories as part of our default right? As people. And so when, once I became aware of that, I noted that in myself that something I would encounter something in the Bible, and really without even thinking about it consciously, I would kind of start to find myself asking, where does this fit inside of this narrative somehow? Right? And then, and then everything kind of has to fit inside this narrative. Or you have these really weird questions that maybe don't make sense inside, then, you know, and you might get a weird look or something like that. And so, and so say more about, um, I don't know, not necessarily maybe the effects of that, but also just like, what, what does it kinda look like in our, in our everyday life that there, that there doesn't seem to be much of an alternative besides what you named, which is kind of just knowing the bits and pieces.
Speaker 2 00:09:49 Yeah. What does it look like in prac practically? Um, I just think that what it, what it looks like practically is that when people start asking questions about how does scripture fit together, how is mission, um, the galvanizing center, the sort of radial point of all the whole Bible, how does that work? That the kinds of books that, um, pastors and mission workers and seminary people are most likely to reach for, are really going to represent variations on this one perspective, uh, which is, as you've already alluded to, basically structured by narrative that the Bible is one big story, uh, and that, um, the story actually has several building blocks that are also shared across these different authors. Uh, and that it kind of goes creation, a world made, made good and perfect, fall human revolt and fall into sin, God's counter initiative to try to fix that problem caused by human revolt and sin.
Speaker 2 00:10:56 And that Jesus Christ is the fulcrum in God's counter initiative to overcome sin in the world leading to a renewed creation. So there's variations, like I say, that you could sort of splice and dice that more finely, but those are the basic building blocks of that perspective. Um, and there isn't really, as I say, much of an alternative to that, the larger backdrop to that story, which is something that, again, is not necessarily accessible to most practitioners. Um, but that if you're sort of in the know of biblical theology and so on, might have a little bit more understanding about the, the longer, uh, discussion that lies behind the those kind of works that we can pull readily off the shelves is that this grand story approach actually had a heyday, um, in the 1940s and fifties, uh, that goes under the heading of the biblical theology movement. And it then suffered a real collapse and downfall in the 1960s and seventies for various reasons we could get into. And, and then there's this new momentum and movement since the 1980s growing out of narrative theology story approaches to the Bible that has influenced a lot, as you said earlier, Alexis, both mainline people and evangelicals. And there are sporadic critiques of that out there, but nothing all that programmatic or developed, and certainly not a different way of understanding how the Bible fits together in service of God's mission.
Speaker 1 00:12:28 Yeah. Okay. So I'm getting like really antsy <laugh> to jump into this article because it's fresh on your mind, because you've wrote, you've written it recently, but it's fresh on my mind because I literally read it before lunch and, uh, <laugh> it's one o'clock. So, um, so I, so the, the title, at least the working title right now is God's Mission Story Centers on Fellowship. And I think that that title, um, it could be seen as a little provocative if you're thinking about this narrative that you just gave kind of these kind of these building blocks. Because even when we were taught to think about mission, but there's, there's nuance to it, and there's maybe a couple of schools of thought, some, so I grew up with kind of the, you're bringing God to people, you know, kind of a school of thought. But then there's, you know, also this, we're joining in God's work in the world, and this work in the world ends up being to take the train from creation to consummation along this track that's been laid out by these authors, like write that you, um, that you reference in your mission.
Speaker 1 00:13:31 And, and you talked about Christ being kind of the fulcrum of, of this, and I'm almost seeing it, you know, kind of like a seesaw, which again, lots of questions in my, like, especially I'm giving about like my nine year old brain. Like, what, what did God make a mistake? What happened? You know, like there's kind of all these, like other like, you know, maybe naive theological questions that kind of, you know, like rolled around in my, in my, in my mind. But, but what, what this, what your papers, what part of what your paper asks is, and I'm, I'm using my words, part of what your paper helps me give a response to is my question of why Jesus.
Speaker 1 00:14:10 Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Yeah. Meaning if, if Jesus is the fulcrum in this, it may be a, a wrong way to think about it, but it's kind of how I grew. I don't know that anyone ever explicitly said this, but it's kind of like, oh, sin entered the world Right? There was fault, and then God had to do something about it, right? Yes. So he's like, maybe he's scrambling. Maybe he kind of had a vision of what this might look like, but what he did about it Yeah. Was send Jesus as this incarnate version of himself, and then Jesus solved that problem, right? Yes. You, you put it in a, in a way that Jesus had a job to do, and he did it. Yes. Um, and, and, and this kind of, this, uh, everything else balances kind of on Jesus' job. Um, but what if, ah, Colin, this feels really scary to say. Like, what if he, what if there's a different way to look at that?
Speaker 2 00:14:58 Yes, there is. There is. Yes.
Speaker 1 00:15:00 Okay, now I'm gonna let you answer that. What, what if that feel really sheepish asking that question, but then what if there's a different perspective?
Speaker 2 00:15:08 Yes. Yes. Yeah, no, and I, I think, Alexis, you asked me this why Jesus question in the, in the hallway earlier this week, and I told you then, and I tell you now, I think that's the right question, or at least it's a very good and productive question. Why Jesus? In other words, why, why did, um, the eternal son become incarnate? And why did, why did, why did he come? Why Jesus? And you are entirely right, and you are channeling the majority Christian tradition, which is sin and salvation, um, that Jesus came to fix, to overcome, to heal the sin problem. Um, and it's not just the sin problem, and I mean, a good complicated, traditional account of what the problems are in the world, that's certainly a significant, maybe major, or the major factor is human sin and revolt, certainly for Christopher Wright, that is the major factor.
Speaker 2 00:16:07 But you can also say sin, the flesh, the devil, um, that there's sort of other forces at, at, you know, at work that are loose in creation, messing it up, uh, oppressing humans, but nonetheless, still the major answer to the why Jesus question would remain to overcome or to fix that problem, the sin fallenness devil problem of with, with humankind and with creation at large. And Christopher Wright does a better job than many in his circle, I think, of, uh, of make connecting Jesus and salvation to creation at large, not just, um, humans, but to the whole creation. Still, though, that whole framing pivots on why Jesus, because of sin fallen this evil and so on, affecting us, affecting all of creation. The alternative is in some ways the minority report within the Christian tradition, though it does have a very long and significant history. I actually first came by it myself, um, when I was, oh, gosh, I don't know, 20 or 21, um, through a Christianity Today article written by Philip Yancy.
Speaker 2 00:17:20 Uh, and he was talking about, uh, actually talking about the medieval, uh, Christian theologian, Dunn's Scotus, uh, who voiced the opinion that the incarnation, um, would've happened anyway, so to speak. That it, it represents God's primordial intention to become incarnate, to be, to unite the divine self with creation. And that article in that year, you could probably find it, I forget the title of it in Christianity Today, made such an impact on me. I thought it was such a beautiful thought, uh, really resonated deeply. Um, and I've since found out of course, that Dun Scotus was not innovative, uh, in his time for defending that opinion, that there's plenty of earlier Christian writers who also share that perspective. But at any rate, it's not, certainly not the majority opinion, and it's a little bit harder to finesse the answer, why Jesus, because God wants to draw near to humans and to draw near to creation. And that's what the Fellowship Weekly gestures towards in the, in the title of that article.
Speaker 1 00:18:30 Yeah. You, when you, and we're, you know, maybe, maybe this won't be the pattern, but kind of starting at the end, I don't know if we're gonna work backwards through the article, but kind of starting at the end with this, because I, I, I told you before we started recording, the Christological piece is just, it's, it's, it's, so, it's, it's a priority for me in kind of how I'm thinking through things right now. And so this, and so this really hit me, but you reference scriptures that we're all familiar with, that, um, you know, Jesus being the beginning and the end, um, you know, all things being made by him and through him and for him, right? And all of these things that we're, that we're so familiar with, you know, um, and, and we can, and we can quote them, but seem to be a bit incongruent with this idea that, that he was, and I don't, I don't wanna say like a divine afterthought or something, but, but sent to repair something, you know, unlike what you just said, if that's the case, what if, you know, I think that's the question.
Speaker 1 00:19:30 What if Adam and Eve had not sinned? What if sin had not entered the world? What if evil had not entered the world? Would there have been a need for Jesus? Which is, which is is part of where you go in this article. It is this, um, I don't know. I, I would say does, does God kind of, these are my words, not yours, but like, does God kind of operate with what, you know, uh, Israel, you mentioned us as, as people Jesus, does he kind of operate like on the basis of utility or need, or is there something deeper or better or different, uh, at play there, which is fellowship <laugh>? Yes. Which is just that God has this desire to be, you know, with us. I think you didn't, you didn't quote it in your article, and it's a, it's a little bit different spin, but I love the beginning of Ephesians, because there's kind of this idea, right, that God ad adopted us even as Gentiles, but just because he wanted to, because it's because that's because He, he just did it because Right. <laugh> Yeah. There isn't like a reason behind that. And we see that you, you, you quote it, um, in the article multiple times in relationship to Israel. It's not because they were anything of use to him. And, and that's sometimes how in the Christian tradition we have placed Israel in this story, if we place them at all. Yes, yes. Um, but it's just that God, God wanted to be with them. Yes.
Speaker 2 00:20:56 Yes. That's right. Yeah. And that, that first chapter to Ephesians has a special place in my heart and formation as well. Um, I actually, when I was in a summer camp, when I was like, again, maybe 15 or 16, they had us memorize Ephesians. And that chapter again, really made such an impact on me. I feel like I was primed in advance to have this very grand primordial view of, um, Jesus and of, uh, kind of God's purposes towards humans and towards creation because of that chapter. Um, yeah. So you're, you're entirely right. And, and the utility piece is, and maybe this to sort of draw it closer to, you know, where some of your listeners might be, because, you know, I'm mindful that christological questions, they worry me, they ve me, they delight me, uh, as, as with you Alexis, but maybe not so much for, for all comers, just that this has, I think, a very practical dimension to it.
Speaker 2 00:21:56 That if we think about our role in other people's lives, that we really, I, I feel like I really want to ensure that I don't have a, a a utilitarian or utility kind of perspective towards other people. I'm not just in people's lives to do a specific job, to fix them, to, you know, minister Patronizingly to them. But that, especially with the relationships that are most important to us, we want to draw on non-instrumental, non utilitarian, non extractive ways of thinking about that the reason that you're with Seth is not to do a job or to, to complete some task for yourself or for him. It's just because you're covenanted in relationship together. And same thing, that scripture is full of these metaphors, these ways of thinking about talking about how God relates to us, how God relates to Israel, how God relates to creation, that are family, kinship, friendship kinds of terms that I think just don't fit very well with a view that God is a fix-it God relative to us.
Speaker 2 00:23:10 Or that the why Jesus question narrows down to an only fix-it Jesus answer. I would also wanna say, I am very, very mindful of how deep and how entrenched and how formidable the forces of sin and death and evil are in the world. In fact, sometimes I want to be more kind of keyed into the triumph of God and the triumph of grace and to, to the resurrection. Um, but to hold onto that in the face of historic atrocities and ongoing evils, it's really difficult that to say, I don't think that this view of why Jesus, because God wants fellowship with creatures, has to diminish our understanding of sin. I don't think it does, but I think it gives us a fuller picture of what God is doing with us and with creation than just repairing it, that God has a desire and a love that's deeper than just bringing us out of the muck and the mire that we find ourselves in.
Speaker 1 00:24:18 Yes. Um, gosh, I'm trying to think, kind of trying to think of where I wanna go next. Um, so this idea of Jesus, and I'm, and I'm gonna use a reference, a scripture that may, may or may not be helpful here, but the thing that keeps going through my mind is the lamb who was slain from the foundation of the world. Right? And this is also like one of these kind of tricky pieces. But if we think about Jesus now as not an instrument of God's reparation, either solely or necessarily, but we think about Jesus as, um, you know, say what I wanna say. I don't wanna even say a means. Now, I'm like real careful about my language here of like <laugh> Jesus being like in incarnate so that we can draw more near
Speaker 2 00:25:10 Yeah. Yeah. Just the presence God. Yeah. The fullness of God, the presence of God, yes to us and us to God.
Speaker 1 00:25:17 And that you, you use this, the, we've talked about, we've, you know, utilitarian and, and instrumental and these kinds of things. But, but here's what I wanna say. 'cause because I think that even this language I have been more attuned to lately, probably since, um, some of the abuse scandals have come out in the church, and this kind of language that I grew accustomed to in my early adulthood, probably in college of, you know, what is I feel called to missions? What do I feel called to, I don't know. I just want God to use me. And it feels now very, like, uncomfortable to say that. And, and we could go off on that rabbit trail. I've just become more, more attuned to that language. But even what I want to say in, in that is how we view Jesus Israel, some of these things that we've been talking about really can affect our own experience of God and our own Yes.
Speaker 1 00:26:14 Kind of personal relationship with him. Who am I? Absolutely. To him, right? Yes. Who, who am I to God? Who am I to Jesus? Am I someone who is useful because I, I'm on the mission field, and this is kinda how you open your article, right? Yes. Of like, of like, what is, is this our, the basis of our relationship with God is we are also kind of my words, not yours kind of tools in his belt, right? That we, he, he's doing work and then he knows that he has, Colin is gonna come over here and teach, and Alexis is gonna do this little podcast, and Seth's gonna do, you know, we've all got these little things that we're gonna do. But, but this is kind of part of it, right? Like, we're doing this because we're, um, because we're useful to him. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:26:56 Yeah. And, and then we have to say, but then what does, and you do ask these questions, but then what does this utilitarian mindset do for us when we think about disability theology? You know, one of the things I remember was very formative for me years and years ago. Um, I had a woman in my life say to me, God loves you so much. I remember she said, I remember when my first grandchild was born, and I tell her all the time, we just loved her so much, and all she did was pee and poop and cry and eat and sleep. You know, like, that was it. There was nothing <laugh>. Yes. She was of no use. Right? <laugh> Yes,
Speaker 2 00:27:33 Yes.
Speaker 1 00:27:34 To the family. She could serve no practical purpose. She really, she, she pooped herself and she cried a lot, and then she took food from the people, and that was it. But the, but the, but the deep, deep love of this grandmother for her granddaughter was almost like nothing she had experienced in her life. Right? Yeah. And, and to, and to imagine, you know, God's love for us detached from some sort of purpose that we might serve in the world, um, is really powerful. But we don't always get that from this grand story.
Speaker 2 00:28:07 Yes, yes. You are so, so, right, Alexis, and I think really touching on what, what's important to me about some of this conversation, which is falls along exactly those lines. That there's ways, uh, that we practice our Christian faith, our, our spiritual practice, our way of serving God in the world, that really do prioritize usefulness, um, to God, being a servant, serving God well, ensuring that you're in the center of God's will. Um, and I, I do believe that there are ways that, that tho that kind of language, that kind of approach can act, can grow out of people's deep security in that they know that they're so beloved by God that they want to turn around and be of use to their savior. I believe that that's the case. But I also think that that, that that sort of discourse, if that's all you grow up hearing, can condition us to prioritize utility to God and God's purposes in the world, and to feeling bad and guilty and useless.
Speaker 2 00:29:14 You know, don't waste your life. That was a really popular book when I was way too young to be encountering it. Um, that can make you feel like it's really shameful, it's bad. Uh, it's defective to not be of maximum service to God. Um, when, again, I think scripture's really full of the, the exact kind of love that you're describing of that grandmother, um, that God brings creatures into, into being. Not because God needs any tools or really anything. God doesn't need anything <laugh>, that's the sort of most orthodox imaginable claim to make about God, but rather out of delight. God has a lot of love to give a lot <laugh>, and that's why make creatures, and why, why maintain and sustain creatures, and why also why, uh, to free creatures from the powers that asphyxiate us. Um, but that it answers to a larger purpose than just that.
Speaker 2 00:30:15 Yeah. So I think all that lands very practically, um, Alexis, and, um, yeah, I, I also am just aware, you mentioned earlier how we tell the Israel story, mostly, I think especially in this mythological literature that's told in terms of Israel having a job, having, having a vocation, having a calling to do a specific thing, to be a specific way in the world, to be alike to the nations, such that sometimes Christians have historically seen that, um, the Jewish nation failed in their purpose somehow, and that because of that failure, there were sort of, God had to start over again and, you know, do the why Jesus as a result of Israel's, um, failure, um, that has very deep anti-Jewish roots that, that specific framing. But even if you move away from that specific framing, we, we do. And this literature does hang on to the vocation and job and utility of Israel, um, which again, I think just runs up against so much of, uh, Hebrew scripture that sees, um, God's care for Israel as non-instrumental.
Speaker 1 00:31:27 Yeah, I, I, you read my mind. 'cause I wanted to go to Israel next, and, and not necessarily as a case study, but I'm also thinking about it is as like there's a, there's a, a christological aspect of the story over here, and then there's like a very, you know, like personal as in like, you know, each and of our own persons. But then I think what, you know, what we can learn from Israel through this perspective can be really powerful, I think for, for, for both of those things. And yes, for the sake of Israel itself. And one of the places that I first encountered, and I'm hoping this is correct, and you can correct me if it's, if it's not one of the places that I kind of first encountered some of, some of the questions that were stirring in my mind that I didn't know how to articulate, um, were articulated by, um, Kendall Solan in mm-hmm.
Speaker 1 00:32:16 <affirmative>, some of the reading that I had done, and basically one of the questions that I remember, and if this isn't him, you tell me. I, I don't think you're thinking of the right author, but one of the things I think I remember him articulating in this grand narrative and kind of how he speaks of the grand narrative is if God is, if God who has proclaimed his unending love for Israel then ends up being finished with Israel Yeah. Because Israel has completed its job, then for you, Christian, what does this say to you about God's character? Would he in fact then dispose of you in the same way that perhaps he has disposed of or divorced Israel as a result of her unfaithfulness or her lack of utilitarian use for him anymore? Christian, what does this say to you about God's character? We have to be very careful about how we tell the Israel story.
Speaker 1 00:33:11 If we claim Israel's God, and if we claim to be yes attached, this is one of my favorite pictures in Exodus, right? The, the, the mixed multitudes attached themselves to the people of Israel as they were, as they were leaving and to and to her God. Yeah. And so, if we as Christians have attached ourselves to that God, and by implication to this people, then what does that say to us? If God has said actually, Hmm, thanks. Here's your paycheck, <laugh>, and we're done. Here's your paycheck and your pink slip, right? Then, then, then what comfort do we have in, in Yahweh's unconditional love if he was so willing to, you know, to give that up on Israel? Yeah. Is this Solan and is this valid <laugh>
Speaker 2 00:33:55 That, that Yes, it is Kendall Solan, and I should just say Kendall Solan is a United Methodist, um, systematic theologian, uh, who now teaches at Candler School of Theology at Emory University. Um, and he's written several, I think, pretty important books for understanding Christian Jewish relations. But if I'm thinking of the same essay that you're talking about, it's comes from his most, it is his most recent book called, um, irrevocable, I forget the subtitle, but it's called Irrevocable is the Main title, and he has peace in there where he does challenge, um, Christopher j h Wright, which I found actually really kind of encouraging because to me, it's the sign of the breaking of the consensus around these issues that there's, it's the, it's the first foretaste of, um, an alternative to what has been the, the default point of view when it comes to Bible and mission.
Speaker 2 00:34:50 And so Kendall Slo in that chapter that in that book challenges, right? Um, and does just basically say in effect, how can we invite, invite people evangelistically say, to know this God, to trust this God, to believe that this God will not forsake them, that God will keep faith with them even if they're faithless, when the way that we tell the Israel story has usefulness and has faithfulness and has potentially divine moving on from and forsaking and kind of discarding as a key feature. So in other words, you're working at cross purposes when you're writing about Bible and mission. If you tell the Israel story in such a way that, that it has utility, it has instrumentality so much at its heart, and then you're inviting other people now to know this God in ways that are probably not as much conditioned by that, or at least I hope not conditioned by that.
Speaker 2 00:35:49 Um, yeah. I'll say too, as far as that, that this article, um, that that piece by Solon was a key encouragement to me that this was sort of a good direction to head. Um, and, but also for me, grew out of this whiplash sensation of reading Christopher Wright's latest book, which is somewhat, this is a response to which is about the great commission and the, the great story of the Bible, and feeling like it was so full of, um, of, of that utility thinking of that disposability thinking is what I call it in the article, which does very deliberately summon, um, disposability as this larger phenomenon in our culture. It's not just a theological thing, but a sort of larger social phenomenon, disposability thinking. Um, so this whiplash of reading Christopher Wright's book, and then also at the same time, this, this summer, I was supposed to review a couple books by Norman Wba, who is this, um, I guess theologian.
Speaker 2 00:36:48 He does, he does works very interdisciplinarily, but he's at, he's at, um, duke University. I think he's mostly known as an ecological or environmental theologian, but that's really too small of a label for the grand, really tangled interdisciplinary thinking He does, but one of his major emphasis is on God's care. God's delight, God's nearness to all creatures, including humans. But, so I was reading these books simultaneously, Christopher Wright, a mission thinker, a well-known exponent of this perspective, and Bible and Mission, and then this other theologian who is not at all directly known to that conversation, but, um, so was so much more inviting to me, so much had so much greater facility, it felt like he was able to draw on Hebrew scripture in ways that are kind of unavailable to Christopher Wright, because you can't really, again, keep saying that God loves Israel for, for, you know, Israel's own sake, and then also have this sort of dimension of usefulness built in and, and then Israel's vocation failing and Jesus coming as the compensation for that and the church kind of being the failing after Jesus. Um, part of the story,
Speaker 1 00:38:03 Um, I'm, I'm pausing because I'm like, I just didn't think this, that where what I'm thinking right now was like where I was, where I was going to head, but, but I do kind of keep coming back to, um, not even, you know, some of the things that I'm accustomed to talking about, uh, not just on the podcast, but it's kind of like, you know, my wheelhouse, you know, having to do with like, um, you know, justice issues and, and God as, you know, God as a God of justice and as a, and as a, and as a rescuer and, you know, kinda all these things be, but, but with the, with the underlying idea that that's because he caress about people in the here and now. Um, and so, and so that's kind of like, I'm, I'm kind of accustomed to thinking that way, but I'll tell you where my mind is going instead, and my mind is going instead to some of these really, um, some of these really personal, um, ideas that we might have about God that I, that I mentioned earlier.
Speaker 1 00:39:03 Um, you know, I, I think about, um, my, I I have, uh, I had an aunt who passed away several years ago, but she had an, uh, a brain, uh, injury, uh, like a natural one. It wasn't caused by a car accident or something, but she had a, she had a brain injury when she was in her early forties, and she lived severely disabled after that. So she was one of the people that, that this happens every day where she was kind of going about her normal life. She had an incident, and then her life from that point forward looked very, very different, um, to the point that she didn't walk on her own after, um, that injury. And, um, she had, she had memory issues and things like that. And when I think about how, um, our family and I, I understand that it also doesn't always happen this way.
Speaker 1 00:39:54 There's not always capacity, um, you know, or ability for things like this to happen. But our family ended up, uh, just really rallying around her. And for the next 20 plus years, um, in my hometown, we all just, you know, with, with the, with the primary, um, uh, caretaking landing on, uh, her parents, my paternal grandparents, we all just cared for her <laugh>. And, and we grieved the woman that we had known those aspects of her personality that had gotten lost. But it was such a real life, you know, I was thinking this morning about, about the what, what a witness is, right? Yes. And it was a witness to me that, um, God just like us in our <laugh>, in our humanity, imperfectly, uh, cared for her, um, in this, couldn't do anything for, for us or even for herself, really. Yes. From that point forward, she wasn't able to live independently.
Speaker 1 00:40:54 She was an artist. She was a, a baker, you know, she was a poet. And all of those things that she did that came out of her, out of her creativity and her talent and all those things were, were gone. They were lost, um, to that incident, but that she wasn't lost. There was an essence of her. Um, and, and she as a person, really, not just her essence, but, but she as a person who she was now even, uh, remained as an object of our love and affection and of our care and imperfectly, um, you know, our family, our family had that new relationship with her for, um, you know, for 20 plus years. And I think that sometimes, um, in our kind of, like you said, mentioned our disposability kind of culture mm-hmm. <affirmative>, how we have some times been trained to think about God, as we mentioned before, um, it doesn't always feel like God might be as faithful as this imperfect family happened to be.
Speaker 1 00:41:50 Wow. Wow. You know, and, and I don't, I think that we would say, as you open your article, we would, we would oppose that with everything that's in us verbally, but if, but sometimes I think not even with anything as dramatic, if I'm going through a dry spell, let's say Yeah. In my spirituality, if I'm hit dark night of the soul, as you know, mother might have said yes. If, if I come to a place where I say, I don't know what my calling is right now, I don't know how I'm supposed to quote minister to anyone else, or I'm just feeling bad, or I'm, I'm going through a depression, or, you know, whatever. Yeah. Do we, um, you know, does our idea of God, um, somehow contrast those ideas that we've had for ourselves? Or does it feed into some of those negative, you know, thought patterns that might that might come in?
Speaker 1 00:42:41 Yeah, so, so I don't really, I mean, like, I don't have a question in that, but I just wasn't necessarily expecting to even be, um, thinking along those lines. Kind of like for us personally, you know, I say as the, as the church, as believers in Jesus as people who trust on him and, and, and maintain, we say we know that he's faithful. Um, maybe just like an invitation, I don't even know, but, you know, like, but how, how are we viewing God in this way and what does it mean for us, you know, personally and as we interact with, with other folks, whether they're believers or not. Yeah. How does, how does this inter view of our interaction between God and us impact how we relate to, to, to ourselves and to other people?
Speaker 2 00:43:23 Yeah. Yeah. No, this might
Speaker 1 00:43:25 Be a better question for your wife, <laugh>.
Speaker 2 00:43:27 No, well, maybe so, probably, but, um, but no, there's so much there, Alexis, and I'm, I'm thankful that you pressed me and your, your listeners with that, um, story. And what a provocative question that is, that sometimes the ways that we conceptualize God might be somehow less committed and faithful and persevering and generous than what you experienced in your family. Um, I think you're right about that, but I really am excited for you as a sort of missiological thinker, because I hope that you'll find ways to bring that experience and that vision, that sort of, um, icon of care into your own thinking about God and God's ways, God's works in the world. Um, I want for myself to try and do that, to try and be true to the kinds of ways of, of thinking about and experiencing God that I've seen in various circles.
Speaker 2 00:44:31 Um, like I mentioned, WBA is sort of an environmental theologian, so he's really oriented towards, uh, non-human creatures. Um, but how God delights in them and cares for them to bring that sort of under this heading of Bible and mission in ways that have not happened much and that haven't had much space, much play in those kind of established discourses. So I hope you be able to do that. There's so much in what you just said that I deeply resonate with. I feel like some of the times of my own life as a Christian, when I've been most palpably, um, aware of Jesus, have been in places of forgottenness forsakenness with people who are imprisoned, who are locked away, who are forgotten, um, who are discarded the throwaway people of this world, that that's where I've been most mindful, most sensible to Jesus. And I, it dismays me that it feels like when I read so much of this literature in this area, which is my ostensible, you know, bailiwick now, but it doesn't have that spirit. A lot of it doesn't.
Speaker 1 00:45:53 Right, right. But we see it in the gospels. We do, we know that it's there. And so, so yeah. So I mean, I think, yeah, I mean, I think there, there's, yeah, there's, there's a lot there. And this just kind of, you know, I don't know who knows this, make it edited out later, but, um, anyway, there's some of those meetings, but we'll see, because I haven't actually had the thought, oh, I don't think God is as loving as my family, so I just kinda wanna clarify that. But I, what, what I do think is true is that sometimes I think that I, you know, what you just said of like this, um, people who have been kind of seen as being discarded. Um, many people in these situations meet Jesus so deeply because I think he wants to live there, right? Yeah. I think it's some of, some folks who, who might have some similarities with me, who may have been, may have been trained to think about God in a certain way, possibly question that if we became someone who was viewed as discarded, would God meet us there too?
Speaker 2 00:46:48 Yeah. Yeah. That's
Speaker 1 00:46:48 The clarity that I wanna bring to that, to that little story is Yeah, I think that there's a, I think that there's a question, and I think that, um, there ought not be that question. I think Jesus, um, compels us in his life to, to communicate to us that that would, would never be a question of, of whether he would meet us in those places.
Speaker 2 00:47:09 Yeah. Yes. And amen to that. That's right. That's right. But I do think, going back to some of the sort of pieces from the article that the Israel question and the Christology question genuinely bear on this kind of very, what we've been talking about just in the last few minutes, practical, spiritual, just the sort of ethos that, you know, sort of governs our lives, that those, the, the, those, there are ways that we can try to make those pieces of our vision about God and, and about the Bible align better with the sensibility that you just said about Jesus and the gospels, the forgotten people, the throwaway people of the world, and the throwaway creatures and throwaway lands of the world as well. Um, just that those are really intimately connected, I think conceptually how we think, how we tell Israel about Israel, how we tell about the, the why, how we answer, the why Jesus question all is just a half step away from the, this complex, this bundle of other practices, dispositions, ways of viewing other people in the non-human world as well.
Speaker 1 00:48:19 Yeah, yeah. No, you're right, you're right. Thanks for reiterating that. Um, okay, last question. You've listened to a few episodes. You know where I'm going, so
Speaker 2 00:48:29 Do I <laugh>,
Speaker 1 00:48:30 Uh, <laugh>. We'll see. Um, okay, so no, the situation is, I mentioned that you're a professor at Fuller. Now. I have, uh, I have not had you as professor, but I love talking to professors because I can often see this little, like gleam in their eye, right? You're having this class discussion, you've just, you've, everyone's read the same thing. We've had this great, you know, I, I think pretty great discussion, but, you know, pretend there's 10 more people in the class, and, and then, and then you can see the professor going, I feel like this is, like, if, if they would just ask, if someone would just raise their hand and say this or ask this, then I'd be able to kind of really get to where I wanted to go. <laugh>
Speaker 2 00:49:09 <laugh>,
Speaker 1 00:49:10 Maybe you've had that experience in class, maybe you haven't, but given this, given this article that is so fresh on your mind, and I think we've had a pretty good discussion about it, what is that question that I didn't ask that if I had brought it up, you would, you would say yes. That that's, that's the thing. What, what's that question that I didn't ask or that point that I didn't bring up?
Speaker 2 00:49:33 I feel embarrassed. 'cause I, I feel like I've tried to listen to, you know, episodes of your show, and I've really enjoyed it. I was actually intimidated coming on like, oh my gosh, Alexis is such a skillful interview where I hope I can, you know, uh, sort of pass muster. But that's a tough one question that you didn't ask. I don't actually in classroom situations, I, I mostly, I'm just trying to pay so much attention to like what the students are saying that I don't feel like I have this reserve, uh, material that I'm hoping somebody will tri, you know, tap into or trigger. Um, I guess where, where I anticipate questions in this, and maybe the question unasked here in this conversation as I'm ruling out this perspective in the class, I'm doing this fall on Bible admission for the first time, for the, the first class I'm doing at Fuller, um, under the Fuller banner, um, is just isn't some of this, um, isn't some of this just, uh, a problem that's so specific to my context?
Speaker 2 00:50:42 So in other words, worrying about the status of Israel, the na, the pe, the Jewish people, this is not something that students from Southeast Asia, for example, bring and it can feel to them like another white preoccupation or caring about the environment in general, bringing up, you know, having some readings that are about creation care or whatever. Again, I think maybe not as extreme a way, but that, that can feel like something that's sort of a bougie, um, you know, sort of progressive seminary type thing to care about, but not very important for mission and not necessarily the kind of bread and butter issues that people in churches all over the world are talking about. More and more they are. So that one's again, maybe, maybe not, I don't know. We'll see. Um, and then, uh, also for me, bringing in indigenous voices and theologians and, and theoreticians can also feel like specifically North American and, um, American, you know, United States American obsession. Aren't you guys just all about race and trying to bring it into everything where it doesn't belong? And so there's all those fronts that are, for me, kind of a integrated whole physiologically that I anticipate will come under fire from students who are not from our specific context.
Speaker 1 00:52:13 Yeah. And you would say to them,
Speaker 2 00:52:18 I would say to them that I think, um, I think that Israel question, I, I agree that attention to the profile, the vocation of Israel has grown out of, uh, conversations, um, that followed the Holocaust. And so in that way, yes, it is a conversation that has emerged from the European experience and European churches, but I think that, um, it pings some really deep threads within the whole fabric of Christian theology in ways that I, I hope I can justify to students who aren't gonna meet Jewish people in their daily lives as Christians, which is a lot of Christians all over the world do not have Jewish people in their communities. And so I'm gonna be fighting uphill against that one. But I think that there's ways I hope that, that I can make that intelligible, um, especially along the lines that we've talked about today, just about how we tell the Israel story, if that's about vocation and failure and God's trying over again with, with somebody else, that, that lands pretty close to home for all, for any of us. For all of us.
Speaker 1 00:53:25 Yeah. Yeah. No, I agree completely. Um, normally at this point, I would restate the title of this book, but I will, and I can restate the title of this journal. The thing is that by the time this airs, it will not have been published, but I will update the show notes <laugh>, when it does get published with the link, uh, for folks who have, I guess, access to that. Um, and, uh, never fear. We have tons of, uh, resources and things like that that we've mentioned, uh, that will also be in the show notes so people can, can look and read and dig in and places that interested them. So this, uh, article that's coming out in January, is that right? That's
Speaker 2 00:54:07 What they said, yeah. Is,
Speaker 1 00:54:08 Is God's mission Story Centers on Fellowship by Colin Cornell. Not new to the professorship world, but new to Fuller. And so thanks for coming on, Colin.
Speaker 2 00:54:19 Thank you so much, Alexis. Really good conversation.
Speaker 1 00:54:24 The links for all the resources mentioned in today's episode can be found in the show notes, music and podcast production by Seth Busti. Be sure to give us a review on iTunes and subscribe at your favorite podcast listening app. You can also visit us at, that makes total sense.com.
