Speaking In Tongues (part 32)

Skipping past what appears to be an interpolation that does not seem to fit at all with the ethos of Paul’s letters (verses 33b-35, which is sometimes found in manuscripts at the conclusion of verse forty, with this fluid placement indicative of its potentially extraneous nature, not unlike the story of the woman taken in adultery of John chapter eight, which is not found in many early manuscripts and sometimes shows up after Luke 21:38), this study picks up with Paul asking the question “Did the word of God begin with you, or did it come to you alone?” (1 Corinthians 14:36)  This is a rather pointed question, and seems to flow quite naturally from the statement concerning disorder and peace.  It is clear that the question is directed to the wider church, but one is forced to wonder why. 

Though dogma-level assertions are probably not possible, considering the regular competitions for honor that took place amidst the meal associations of the day, it is possible that here Paul speaks to the possibility of multiple church bodies within the same community entering into some type of similar honor competition that pitted body against body in their attempts to honor their object of worship (namely Jesus).  As it is quite easy to see churches effectively competing against each other for members, for recognition, and for the types of public honors that are available in our own time, this possibility does not seem overtly remote. 

Closer to home, an individual member of the body that was the primary recipient of this message (leaving open the possibility that this letter was directed to multiple assemblies of Christ-worshipers) could hear these words in a more personal manner, as they follow hard upon Paul’s insistence that participation within the church should be widespread, with all exercises attributed to the influence of the Spirit accorded equal value. 

This equal valuation of the Spirit’s presence and the person through whom the Spirit is active (with whether or not Jesus’ Lordship, which can be declared in any number of ways, and especially in ways that are derived from the understanding of the Jesus tradition that was then in circulation prior to the formation of the Gospels as we have them, is affirmed as the sole determiner of the activity of the Spirit of the Creator God), along with the insistence upon mutual subjection (preferring one another in humility) in the exercise of the gift that Paul most highly encouraged, provides a helpful framework in which a hearer could understand the words of verse thirty-six, making it possible to understand it as Paul’s continued encouragement for individuals to continually disavow the personal accumulation of honor. 

Hearing these words in this way could lead to seeking opportunities for community affirming mutual subjection that is based upon the desire to emulate the one to whom they look as Lord (who consistently sought out the lowest place rather than the highest place while instructing His disciples to do the same, who performed the role of a slave, and who set Himself amidst those considered to be possessive of shame or who stood completely outside the system of honor and shame, such as children) and who is deserving of all honor.  

In This Is Love (part 3)

Though it is never appropriate to hunt and peck through the Scriptures for isolated proof texts to support positions, “tohu” and “bohu” stand in stark contrast to that which is insisted upon in Isaiah, which is that the Creator God “formed the earth and made it; He established it, He did not create it without order, He formed it to be inhabited” (45:18b).  Though this can have the appearance of proof-texting as part of an effort at Scriptural exegesis, it actually falls well in line with a grasp of the overall narrative-based structure of Scripture that reveals the Creator God, pointing readers to that God’s long-held plan to redeem a fallen creation into which disorder was disastrously introduced.  This seems to be well within the line of thought suggested by the covenant God’s creation becoming “without shape and empty,” which also suggests some type of catastrophic activity that produced such a state. 

Is it proper to here insert an idea of the devil sinning from the beginning?  Is it appropriate to here posit the reported fall of Lucifer and his cohorts, as they seem to have entered into a violation of their covenants with the Creator God (sin), with the result of that violation being a world subjected to tohu and bohu?  Is it possible that the author of John views the world through this type of cosmology?  One should dare not become dogmatic in this area, but this could very well account for the insistence that the devil had been sinning from the beginning. 

If this is so, then the creation account of Genesis, which reflects the ordering of the world into a cosmic temple in which the Creator God would rest (which would have fit well within ancient near east mythology and the idea that a temple was the resting place of a god), is the restoration of the world to the state which had been previously established by its Creator, as it had been marred by the first act of covenant unfaithfulness, with this marring carried out by the one now referred to as the devil. 

If this is so, then it becomes possible to gain an even better understanding of the role that is given to Adam.  Why is Adam created?  Why is the one that is called the son of God revealed?  First and foremost, it is to bear the image of the Creator God in and to and for His creation, in proper and loving stewardship of the world.  That was part and parcel of the covenant that the Creator God is said to have made with Adam, with the mark of that covenant being Adam’s obedience in regards to the trees from which he could and could not partake.  Secondly, it is to be in a position to come against and destroy the works of the devil, who, as is revealed in the Genesis account of the activities in the garden, is present in the world.

If this is a reasonable position, then one can see that the author of the letter goes on to write about an ideal situation in which “Everyone who has been fathered by God does not practice sin” (John 3:9a).  Sin, as one must remember in an effort to constantly steer away from thinking about sin as “the bad stuff that I do,” is “being unfaithful to the covenant that is designed to bring glory to the Creator God via man’s participation in his role of stewardship of the creation, and thereby falling short of the Creator God’s intention for man as His image-bearer in and to and for this world.” 

The author goes on to write that the reason those fathered by the Creator God do not practice sin is “because God’s seed resides in him, and thus he is not able to sin, because he has been fathered by God” (3:9b).  This hardly describes Adam, so it should be reiterated that this is an ideal representation, which would then appear to be hyperbolic usage that is designed to point his audience to the uniqueness of the one that is most properly looked to as the Son of God, and to His unbroken faithfulness to God’s covenant.