A New Story? # 9 - Before Creation, Christ

A few posts ago I mentioned that we get to "The Fall" too abruptly in our renditions of the biblical story. It seems absurd, but it may be that we get to "Creation" too quickly also.

It's an absurd thing to claim, because the first verb used in the Bible is "create", and it is a word that pops up repeatedly throughout the Bible's opening chapter. But for Chrisitians, the is another Word that comes before any word in Scripture.

Judaism developed this kind of thought into its worldview, with personified Wisdom seen to be in existence before the worlds were created. For the emerging Christians of first-century Palestine, Christ became that Wisdom.

If there is an answer to the question "why?", it is not found in Genesis but in passages like Colossians 1:15-20. Creation was created for Christ. We are, in Triniarian thought that is completely alien to the original meaning of Genesis 1-2 but nonetheless valid, the Father's gift to the Son.

But there is more. Lest we think of ourselves as simply objects in a divine show of affection, we who are a gift have also received a gift - "For God so loved the world, that he gave his unique Son..." The same love that the Father has for the Son he also has for the world. The Son received the world, the world received the Son.

When Christ is placed at the beginning, what is traditionally the first act of the biblical narrative -- creation -- can be properly understood. Not only are we objects created for the good pleasure of God, but we are subjects to be known by God, as he is a subject to be known by us. Though there are vast distinctions between Creator and creation, there is a mutuality that can't be ignored, especially when our beginnings are founded upon the Word who would become flesh and dwell amongst us.

Film Watchers

Do we have a duty to be responsible, informed, and thoughtful film watchers? If stories are powerful things, how dangerous is it to be uncritical about them? Can we really just shut our brains off and enjoy some "harmless fun", or in doing so are we numbing our imaginations and moral consiousness? What about films that aim at seriousness and critique, such as American Beauty for example? How well versed are we to see what is really going on, what message is being communicated?

The stories we are drawn to will shape us, for better or worse. This reality should have profound affects on all that we watch and the way we watch it.

"Could still be fun though."

A Narratable Gospel?

We have not thought of Paul as a storyteller, for the Jesus stories of the Gospels are absent from his letters. Yet his use of narrative is very important…because Paul’s central concern was to use the narrative [of Jesus] to form a moral community. The pivotal story for Paul was simple and astounding: God’s son and anointed one was the very Jesus who was most shamefully crucified, dead, and buried, but whom God then raised from the dead, exalted to share his own throne and very name in heaven, to sit at God’s right hand as Lord until all things would be subjected to him and God alone would reign in righteousness over all his people and creation. The drama of Paul’s career turns on his recognition that that story shattered and recreated his own conception of a life lived in obedience to God’s will.

This paragraph is from The Origins of Christian Morality by Wayne Meeks, which is then quoted by Richard Hays in his essay "Is Paul's Gospel Narratable?"

I'm in love with the last sentence by Meeks, and will echo it to form a definition of repentance:

Repentance means recognizing that the story of Jesus shatters and recreates our conception of a life lived in obedience to God's will.