Marginal Christianity

Perverse Patriotism is the unique and exclusive loyalty (what we call “faith”) to apocalyptic Jesus that serves him in a Subversive Counter-Revolutionary Movement             (SCRM, a.k.a. in polite society as “church”)  Perverse Patriots Serve Apocalyptic Jesus Not a wisdom Jesus or a prophetic Jesus. Both seek to “make a difference” in the world as we know it. The former by helping us “get along” in it; the latter by making it a bit “better.” Either Jesus allows this world as it is to set the parameters for its reality. Either Jesus trades on the conventional difference believed to exist between patriotism (good) and nationalism (bad). I believe the Jesus I argue for undercuts the coherence of this distinction and places both in question. Apocalyptic Jesus is the Jesus who inaugurates a new world defeating the powers that sustained the old world rendering it decaying and passing away. That new world is the reality in which Apoca...

Introduction The Book The book of Revelation was likely written in the 90’s a.d. to seven communities of faith in Asia Minor in the Roman Empire under Emperor Domitian. Written by a Seer named John (probably not the author of the fourth gospel), it presents itself as a pastoral letter, a prophetic announcement, and an apocalypse. -As a pastoral letter Revelation offers practical wisdom for churches in the crucible of living faithfully amid the most powerful empire on earth. Here we discover the focus of the book. -As a prophetic announcement Revelation provides the content from which the Seer draws his pastoral counsel. -As an apocalypse (a revelation, the first Greek word of the document, from which it gets its name) Revelation gives us an x-ray (as it were) into the character of the empire, the kingdom of which God is the King, and what it means to participate in God’s Kingdom). From this aspect of the book we get the necessary perspective from which to hear it c...

The Baptist theologian James William McClendon once reported a story about Clarence Jordan, the founder of an interracial community called  Koinonia Farm . Jordan, who described his community as a “demonstration plot” for the Kingdom of God, asked his brother, Robert, to assist him in the struggle against the racial injustices of the Jim Crow South. Robert was keenly aware of the community’s hardships: Local citizens boycotted the farm, the Ku Klux Klan bombed the produce stands, and ominous letters flooded the mailbox. The cost weighed heavily on him. “Clarence, I can’t do that,” Robert said, declining his brother’s request. “I follow Jesus, Clarence, up to a point.” “Could that point by any chance be—the cross?” Clarence replied. “That’s right. I follow him to the cross, but not  on  the cross. I’m not getting myself crucified.” Today we find ourselves in the cleft between Clarence’s invitation and Robert’s refusal. White Christianity in America is mounting a...

Larry Hutardo May 3, 2016 Prompted by a recent guest lecture on the Book of Revelation given here, I pondered to myself again how unusual the book is. We (scholars) typically associate Revelation with a body of ancient texts that we classify as “apocalyptic” writings. But, actually, Revelation stands out in a number of interesting features that may signal something historically significant. Typically, for example, “apocalyptic” texts are pseudonymous, fictively ascribed to some ancient figure such as Abraham, Moses, Enoch or Ezra. And typically, the texts pretend to be revelations given to such a figure about events that were “future” for him, but are actually recent/past events for the real readers.  Examples include the Apocalypse of Abraham, the Book of Jubilees, 4 Ezra, 1 Enoch , 2 Baruch, and a few others. But perhaps the most well-known example is the book of Daniel in the Old Testament, especially Daniel 7–12. The intended message in these texts see...

Seth Richardson on December 23, 2015 This year, I’m dreaming of an apocalyptic Advent . I need fresh imagination for what God is doing in the waiting and hoping everyone keeps talking about, and I think it’s apocalyptic. That’s what Advent is, after all – the church’s choice to participate in the arrival , and then proleptic unfolding, of that Great Cataclysm: the Incarnation of the Son of God. In that Great Cataclysm, the Son unveiled God and made him known – at once answering, disrupting, and transforming the aching hope for deliverance. Yes, apocalyptic . Advent doesn’t really do much unless it’s apocalyptic . If Advent isn’t apocalyptic, then nothing ever changes. Advent is like the uncle who circles around once a year and stumbles into our living room. The routine feels a bit different from normal, but mostly predictable. It’s easy to put things back together like they were before, after he leaves. Read more at http://www.missioalliance.org/an-apocalyptic-advent/...

http://www.themennonite.org/issues/17-5/articles/From_tragedy_to_apocalypse First, an apocalyptic perspective recognizes that the Spirit is often present precisely when we are most vulnerable. At one level, we know that vulnerability—particularly within the covenant of marriage or a trusting group of friends—is a path to intimacy and joy. Yet we often avoid vulnerability at all costs. Especially in times of cultural upheaval, the absolute certainty of conviction—on either side of the issue—provides a welcome sense of security.   Yet our tradition is littered with the wreckage of well-intended groups whose moral clarity led to endless fragmentation and division; or, at the other extreme, with groups who sought to resolve conflict by retreating to the safety of spiritualism and the invisible church and simply disappeared from history altogether. If a tragic perspective on the future offers the security of predetermined outcome, an apocalyptic perspective calls us to live into th...

Bruce Longenecker, The Triumph of Abraham’s God. So well put: [T]he driving force behind Paul’s theological presentations is the invasion of God into the world in order to subjugate forces that run contrary to God’s will and to set relationships aright. Behind any concerns for ethics, ecclesiology, pneumatology, Christology, and the like, lies a theology that focuses on God as the cosmic overlord of creation. Theology of this sort is fundamentally ‘theodicy’—that is, a defence of God’s reputation as the one in control of this world, despite any appearances to the contrary. Pauline theodicy describes how God’s sovereignty remains intact despite threats from opposing forces. It focuses on the divine reclamation and rectification of the cosmos, something inaugurated in Christ, driven on by the Spirit and completed eventually when God becomes ‘all in all’ (1 Cor. 15.28). At heart, then, Paul’s gospel is not simply about soul-saving, involving ethical or doctrinal teaching. Such fe...