Contradiction?

This Sunday we get to what is probably the most well-known passage in James because it has caused so much confusion over the years.

I don’t recommend going down this rabbit hole, but if you Google “Bible contradicts itself”, this is one of the passages I can almost guarantee you’ll be pointed to, because James says, in several different ways, that we are “justified” by what we do and not by faith alone. Which sounds like a direct contradiction of Romans 3 & 4 and Ephesians 2 where Paul emphatically insists that we are made righteous in God's eyes by grace alone through faith alone...and not by anything we can do.

Houston, we have a problem. Obviously, this is the end of Christianity. Google has single handedly brought 2,000+ years of redemptive history crumbling to the ground.

But what if I told you that James and Paul are complimentary and there’s no contradiction here at all but rather rich, vibrant, and infallible teaching about how we “justify” justification?

Blessed in our doing

Our Epistle reading in James this week teaches us to be “doers of the word.” James goes on to describe “pure and undefiled religion” that addresses orphans and widows in their affliction.

Some people think that what we believe is less important than what we do. And, in fact, I can think of many people who do meaningful, kind, and courageous things for others that exemplify goodness regardless of whether they were acting out of religious knowledge or conviction. I’ve been served by healthcare professionals, teachers, first-responders, trades people, neighbors, and many others that have stood by me and those I love to provide compassion, care, practical and financial help, and comfort when it was most needed—many of whom were not Christians.

And so, I wonder, what makes what we do any different than what all good people do whether or not they are Christians?

Our readings this week help us understand what makes us uniquely “blessed in our doing.”

Quite Literally Gods Armor

Nearly every Christian is familiar with the armor of God in Ephesians 6:10–20, and assume the various pieces described by St. Paul to fight spiritual battles correlate primarily to what he would have known firsthand as the arms and armor of Roman legionaries during his life in the Empire. Fewer are aware that every piece of armor he describes traces its roots back to the Old Testament. In fact, the armor given to you and me for his fight against the forces of sin and darkness is quite literally God’s armor—armor designed for and worn by God first and foremost.

This means that we fight and stand firm only in the strength that comes from the victory Christ has already won for us. This is why every piece of armor ultimately points us to Christ.

Quite liberating

Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina contains one of the most provocative and insightful opening lines in literature (IMHO): “All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way”. This means that there are just a few distinguishable and necessary common attributes of healthy and happy family relationships, but a myriad of ways to make them unhappy. According to Wikipedia this is called “The Anna Karenina Principle”. Who knew?

Although this “principle” may seem rigid, restrictive, and/or anachronistic to some, it’s actually quite liberating. Just a few simple—though not easy—things you have to get right in order to be happy. This, of course, extends to marriage, the family’s foundation.

In a passage from Ephesians on marriage that to many today seems rigid, restrictive, and anachronistic, this week’s Epistle lays out just a few simple—though not easy—common attributes of happy Christian marriages. And they’re quite liberating.

How should we then sing?

Besides church, try to imagine other times and places where you sit or stand with a group of people you don’t know and sing. Where does that happen? Sometimes at a birthday party. Or you might stumble through Auld Lang Syne on New Year’s Eve. Or maybe during the seventh inning stretch if the game’s going well.

 Imagine going to your favorite coffee shop, standing up, and saying, “Let’s just sing a few songs together!” I doubt you’d get much participation because culturally, today, that would be weird.

 However, in the seminal book, “Worship and the Early Church”, scholar Ralph Martin writes, “The Christian Church was born in song.” Singing together has, is, and will forever be a vital part of Christian worship.

 But why should we sing? And just as importantly, how? Is there a theology of singing?

Familiar Food

If you’ve ever been far from home, you’ll likely know how wonderful it is to taste familiar food. Though some of us, like me, love exotic food from all over the world, there is something transcendent about your favorite home-town pizza or your mom’s lasagna.

When I was a child, my Swedish grandmother made wonderful bread rolls that, when buttered and accompanied with cheese and coffee, seemed to make time stop. The most exciting day of my year would be the day my family set out on the annual road trip, early in the morning before sunrise. My grandmother would bless us with rolls for the journey. Sitting in the front seat with my dad, discreetly leaving the sleeping neighborhood and heading out onto the open road with a cup of coffee and a roll from grandma was exhilarating and brought the experience to its fullness. It’s what the Elves’ lembas must have evoked in the hearts of the hobbits. For years afterwards, just smelling grandma’s rolls baking could transport me back to those memories.

Jesus proclaims to the Jewish people that he is the bread of life. Why the metaphor, Jesus? Why the symbolism? When Jesus invites us to put our faith in him, he does not intend a dull transaction of mere intellectual assent. He invites us to experience the fullness of a relationship that nourishes, satisfies, and exhilarates us. Bread is fundamental to life. Not just existing, but living.  

I’ve been asking myself, how do we eat this bread? How do we experience its fullness?

I look forward to engaging more fully with Jesus’ words from John 6 with you this Sunday.  

In Messiah,

Steve Engstrom+

Walking differently

A few years ago I heard a brief interview with a gentleman who’d served as a sentry at The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery. He was asked what the most difficult part of the experience had been, and his answer was immediate and intriguing: “Learning how to walk”.

If you’ve ever been to the tomb—and I hope you have—you know exactly what he was talking about. They don’t walk like anyone else in Arlington, or anywhere else for that matter. They walk differently. They walk in a manner worthy of their calling—whatever the weather or time of day, regardless of whether anyone’s watching or not—or they don’t walk there at all.

In this week’s Epistle reading, St. Paul calls us—you and me—to walk differently, too. To walk in a manner worthy of our calling.

But just what does that mean?

Love beyond reason

St. Paul, was someone who studied and wrote deeply on the vast implications of the cross where Jesus became our substitute. Someone who’d looked intensely into the incongruity of how sinners could ever be inexhaustibly loved by a holy God. Someone who’d plumbed the depths of how much it cost God to express his heart for us in giving up his only son, and marveled how long this love would last. Someone who’d had his soul shaken at every discovery. This Apostle who was normally so precise in his writing—when struggling to communicate this love in this week’s Epistle reading—could only muster vague(ish) talk about dimensions... “the breadth and length and height and depth” of God’s love for us.

But this is the very kind of love the human heart craves. We all want to be swept away, to be loved in spite of ourselves, to be fully accepted, to be cherished, to really matter to someone. We want to be caught up in someone’s arms when we fall, we want someone to watch over us, to be enraptured in the lavish love of someone who knows all our brokenness yet will never turn away. We want to experience love beyond reason.