I was so inspired by the piece on Speaking of Faith that I mentioned in my previous blog that I purchased Gregory Boyd's book, "The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the Quest for Political Power is Destroying the Church." I am only about 1/4 through the book, but I am already blown away. Boyd's basic thesis is that "a significant segment of American evangelicalism is guilty of nationalistic and political idolatry...Rather than focusing our understanding of God's kingdom on the person of Jesus - who, incidentally, never allowed himself to get pulled into the political disputes of his day - I believe many of us American evangelicals have allowed our understanding of the kingdom of God to be polluted with political ideals, agendas, and issues." (p.11). Those are some serious words. And Boyd is speaking from within the evangelical community. I am excited to learn how he works this all out systematically. But, I have to say that I like where he is going.
One of things that Boyd does to illustrate his point is to contrast of the kingdom of God with the kingdom of this world. One such contrast is that Boyd says the kingdom of God is about "power-under." What he means is the power of self-sacrificial love for humanity. This focus is contrasted with the kingdom of this world's focus on "power over," essentially having the means to coerce someone into behaving they we want them to. There is a great quote that powerfully illustrates this contrast. Boyd writes, "when God flexes his omnipotent muscle, it doesn't look like Rambo or the Terminator - it looks like Calvary! (p. 32)
So, I am reading the news today and I see this article about a college softball game where a girl hit a home run, but injured herself running around first base. She would have been called out is someone from her team tried to help her, so two girls from the opposing team lifted her up and carried her around the bases, thus eliminating themselves from playoff contention. You can read more about it at this link: http://msn.foxsports.com/olympics/story/8091708?MSNHPHCP>1=39002. This is precisely what I think that Boyd meant by "power-under." This story is inspiring because it demonstrates an ethic that is contrary to the "win-at-all-costs" mentality of the "power-over" kingdom of this world. In a humble way, these young women perfectly demonstrated the ethic of the kingdom of God.
Saturday, May 03, 2008
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1 comments:
I'll have to check Boyd's book out, sounds like an interesting read. Let me know if the last 3/4 of the book is as good as the first 1/4.
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