Seminary Without Walls

This post was submitted by Mary Miller, Director of Making Connections Initiative

James Weldon Johnson, the poet who wrote the words of “Lift Every Voice and Sing” (Covenant Hymnal No. 732), was imbued with eclectic talents. Songwriter, diplomat, poet, novelist, journalist, teacher, civil rights leader, he was one of the prime movers in the Harlem Renaissance. Preachers know well his record of negro sermons from the turn of the last century in the collection, “God’s Trombones’, with its popular “The Creation”. Also in the collection is a wonderful essay on the tradition of pastoral prayer before the sermon. Less well known, but moving is his poem honoring the ministry of music in those who inspired him in “O Black and Unknown Bards”.

Johnson tells of the genesis of the hymn known now as “The Black National Anthem”:

“A group of young men in Jacksonville, Florida, arranged to celebrate Lincoln’s birthday in 1900. My brother, J. Rosamund Johnson, and I decided to write a song to be sung at the exercises. I wrote the words and he wrote the music. Our New York publisher made mimeograohed copies for us, and the song was taught to and sung by a chorus of five hundred colored school children.

Shortly afterwards my brother and I moved away from Jacksonville to New York, and the song passed out of our minds. But the school children of Jacksonville kept singing it; they went off to other schools and sang it; they became teachers and taught it to other children. Within twenty years it was being sung over the South and in some other parts of the country. Today the song, popularly known as the Negro National Hymn, is quite generally used.

The lines of this song repay me in elation, almost of exquisite anguish, whenever I hear them sung by Negro children.”

Photo taken from www.cbcnews.ca

In light of the spectacular inaugural event of our 44th President, Barack Hussein Obama, NPTS faculty and staff were asked to sum up in 3 sentences or less their thoughts and impressions of the inauguration.  Thank you to all who participated for sharing your heartfelt thoughts.

Obama gave a magnificent and brutally uncompromising speech. All temptation to moderate campaign promises and goals in the face of crisis was decisively rejected.

Stephen Chester

“Where were you when JFK was shot?” Remembering the moment when the space shuttle Challenger blew up. Where were you during the tragic events of 9/11? When tragedy and crisis serve as the symbols of unity, it often leads to cynicism, (a very common malady for the younger generation). As of January 20, 2009, hope has replaced cynicism.

Soong-Chan Rah*

African-American cadence in both inaugural address and Lowry prayer moves the listener with it, with confidence, with hope evocative of an “Amen,” -so be it.

Richard Carlson

In President Barack Obama whose campaign was driven by the theme of hope, so many Americans saw in his election forgotten dreams coming to fruition. It was a personal reminder to pray for our president. As much as our elected leaders can indeed act as servants of God (Rom. 13:4), no one person can embody hope other than the author of our salvation, Jesus Christ. He will need God’s grace and God’s hand to work for the good of all.

Max Lee

Millions, MILLIONS, all over the world watching transfixed as this nation stood to hear the OATH of office. We know the challenges are great, we know that many are still disappointed that “their man” didn’t “win”; BUT the will of millions is clearly to pull together, to get around this new president, and to help shoulder the burden. We should remember daily that his life and the life of his family is from this day on always under threat. Pray for that concern.

Linda Cannell

The inauguration made me want to dance with joy. The music, the prayers, poetry and speech come together in a message of hope, joy, tolerance and love. Yes, we are facing difficult financial times, but we still have so much for which to be thankful.

Guylla Brown

Two “simple gifts” were highlights: Yo-Yo Ma’s joyful expression as he played so beautifully, and the news from commentators that Obama’s daughters will be making their own beds.

Kris Bruckner

I was moved by the radiant, tear stained faces in the crowd.

Jay Phelan

Where else in the world would the entire service of transfer of power be completed in less than 40 minutes? Most speeches by world leaders are just getting warmed up in that amount of time. I was also struck with how many references were given to the peaceful transfer of power, another feature of our American system for which we can be truly thankful.

Paul De Neui

I thought Lowry’s prayer was moving, intergenerational, hopeful, challenging, demanding and inspiring. I prayed. May we embody this in days ahead. The music and the musicians were beautiful!

Phillis Sheppard

It was so encouraging (and such a nice change) to see President Obama delivering a powerful, energizing speech to this country that is desperately in need of motivation and hope.

Jess Stanley

I was moved by the panoramic views of the sea of people standing, cheering, singing, crying and even saluting in the cold, the overwhelming sense of how much good will there was for this president, and how hopeful people are even when the outward circumstances of many people’s lives are more difficult rather than less so. Our nation is at a ”crossroads” moments, an open moment. Will we live into this sense of good will and possibility with maturity and a new understanding?

Helen Cepero

Today’s inauguration of President Barack H. Obama was one of the most important moments in my life: God has opened the windows of heaven and poured out blessings upon him and his family.

Velda Love

I felt an amazing sense of hope that so many people could come together to support this man from our own city and a sense of excitement that we have a new president who can both inspire and lead.

Mary Chase-Ziolek

In my mind, the singing of “My Country, Tis of Thee” by Aretha Franklin was especially fitting. Denied a concert at Constitutional Hall, in 1939, African-American Marian Anderson sang that patriotic song to open her concert at the Lincoln Memorial. For the first time in a long time, I feel great pride in my country.

Bob Hubbard

I felt astonishment at what we, as a people, can accomplish fueled simply by hope and an overwhelming desire for change. I also thought of the Obama girls, Sasha and Malia, and how my own daughters can now know that there is someone in the White House just like them.

Deidre J. Robinson

“We encounter each other in words, words spiny or smooth, whispered or declaimed; words to consider, reconsider’ (Inaugural poem by Elizabeth Alexander). January 20, 2009 was a good day for words.

Paul Koptak

*To read more of Soong-Chan Rah’s thoughts on the inauguration of President Barack Obama, check out his blog www.xanga.com/scrah

What were your thoughts while watching the inauguration of President Obama?

Velda Love, Director of the Center for Justice Ministries, contributed this post.

The standard greeting upon the stroke of midnight on December 31^st is “Happy New Year” That’s because in every time zone on the planet we’ve officially begun a new year that’s dated January 1^st. This year I said this phrase less only because I’m concerned if I start out the year this way I’ll give well-wishers a false sense that it is indeed going to be a happy new year. Now, don’t think me pessimistic. My hope for everyone is that they sustain an attitude of happiness through the year. However, as I get older and pay attention to what’s happening on a global scale, I can’t say I’m as happy as I’d like to be. 2008 was a horrible year for millions of people and not just in the United States. The human family across the globe is witnessing an economic downturn like never before. The housing market is at an all-time low and families with medium to middle incomes face foreclosure on their dream homes which were once their long-term financial nest eggs. Two days before Christmas I watched people walk away from GM plants. Some of these people have spent their entire careers building automobiles and this is all they know. What does the future hold for them and how can I even begin to think they feel sentiments of happiness as they face unemployment and an uncertain future. The war along the Gaza strip has escalated; and the United States is still spending billions of dollars a day on the war in Iraq. Happy New Year!? Well, I can say I’m happy that Barack Obama will be the 44^th President of the United States. I’m happy that children of color have a new leader that will inspire them to reach their highest potential. I’m happy we as a country are finally voicing our opposition to greedy business leaders and corrupt politicians. So, I guess there are a few things that make me happy. Finally, I’m happy God is still in control of the earth and everyone on it. My faith is grounded in God; a God who will see us through another year; regardless of whether we’re happy for the next 359 days. Ok, I’ll say it and mean it—Thank you God and may we all have a New Year where happiness meets us daily.

Klyne Snodgrass, Paul W. Brandel Professor of New Testament Studies at NPTS, is the author of this post

Conflict always creates interest and never more so than when it is between good friends. I do not like conflict, but I must confess it is often quite instructive. Two recent incidents brought that home to me in new ways. One involved my class on Romans, and the other involved two scholars at one of the sessions of the Society of Biblical Literature meeting in Boston the week before Thanksgiving.

My Romans class was dealing with Romans 7, a passage heavily debated by New Testament scholars as to whether it speaks of Paul’s preconversion experience, his postconversion experience, or whether it is not about Paul at all but about humanity in general or even about Israel. Among the three of us who teach New Testament here at North Park there are three different positions. I am not sure which position Jay Phelan, our president, holds, for he is also a New Testament scholar. On the night in question one of my New Testament colleagues, Max Lee, came to class, and he and I had a conversation about the issues. I was surprised how informative it was for students to watch us converse. Max and I will remain good friends, even if neither of us convinces the other.

The conversation in the Romans class pales in comparison to a conflict at the Society of Biblical Literature between Richard Hays and Tom Wright, who are very close friends and very close theologically. Richard had edited a collection of about eighteen essays with Beverly Gaventa. The essays were written by a group of biblical scholars, historians, and theologians who met twice a year for three and a half years to discuss the identity of Jesus. The resulting book Seeking the Identity of Jesus (Eerdmans, 2008) is a significant discussion. In fact, both Scot McKnight at North Park University and I had written blurbs that were published on the back of the book, both of us emphasizing that these essays were important and should be read. The session was discussing this book. Tom Wright thought the book was awful—that is not his word, but it sums up the idea. Tom complained publically that he did not know what Scot and I were thinking. Richard responded that he felt Tom’s words were not a response but a smear campaign. Remember, these guys are good friends. I e-mailed both later and know that they are continuing in pretty constant dialogue trying to sort out the issues. They are still friends. I think one main point of difference is the way Tom thinks history should be done and his refusal to give any privilege to creed and canon, two items under consideration in the book. Tom is so involved in discussion with people like John Dominic Crossan and the Jesus Seminar that he wants to strip himself of anything but “pure” history, i.e., to do history better than Crossan and the Jesus Seminar (which I do not think is hard to do!) and to beat them at their own game. He sees red at anything that would privilege canon and creed, even though he very much agrees with both in the end. Some of the essays in the book point out, rightly I think, that it is necessary not merely to ask who Jesus was, but who he is and what his impact was. Can you know his identity without asking those two questions? I think not.

One important point in all this is the way we deal with our disagreements. Can we disagree without sacrificing the character of the gospel in the way we act and talk and without sacrificing our friendships? The answer is yes.

Posted by Jim Dekker, Co-Director of Center for Youth Ministry Studies at North Park University

Having spent much time in various capacities and contexts of youth ministry the term “whatever” captures my attention. To me, it means that youth ministry happens in so many ways, at so many levels, and in so many diverse contexts. What happens can be whatever the situation demands. Having said that, I am not the only one saying “Youth Ministry: Whatever”. For some, youth ministry may be a ‘whatever’ program that chases whatever likes and dislikes of adolescents: this game, that activity… Ten minutes later, another “whatever”, and so the program changes into whatever. And then there is the mood of “whatever”. The kind of thing said when an adult requires something from a reluctant or stubborn teen. The message is: “I will do it but it doesn’t mean anything to me”.

Youth Ministry in our churches may be similar. We may have a program where teens participate but it has little meaning. We may be doing a ministry that chases whatever opinionated wind that blows. Or we may be doing youth ministry based on whatever worked for the temporary youth leader (or intern) years ago. I propose that any of these “whatevers” are unhealthy for the church community and the impacts they have on youth.

Meaningful youth ministry takes work. It pays attention to youth culture, today’s varied family systems, and the capacities of adolescents. Meaningful youth ministry is informed by deliberate theological perspectives that provide hope and strength in today’s cultural soup of confusion. Meaningful youth ministry takes seriously the ‘first break-up’ just as it would the impact of divorce or the death of a high school friend. It respects the Scriptures when many call for “… just wanna have fun.” It goes on missions trips to other cultures when people are saying, “just serve our own community.” It talks about sex and drugs, suicide and depression, self injury and anorexia when all seems fine in our community. In short, youth ministry is just that, Youth Ministry: Seriously

For more information about the Center for Youth Ministry Studies click here.

Bob Hubbard is Professor of Biblical Literature at North Park Theological Seminary. His commentary on Joshua (Zondervan) will appear in April, 2009.

As a Christian, I don’t think that I’ll ever be comfortable with all the killing in the book of Joshua. At least, that’s one of the conclusions I drew after recently finishing a commentary on the book of Joshua. This blog—the first one I’ve ever written, by the way—gives me a chance to articulate some of my thinking on the thorny problem of violence in Joshua. If past experience is any guide, some of my reflections may draw fire like a duck flying through a blind of waiting hunters.

In one sense, my discomfort with Joshua may be a good sign. Its roots may go back to the influence of the ethic of nonviolence taught and modeled by Jesus on my own attitude toward violence. It may also reflect how much Jesus has formed my perception of the character of God as loving. Conversations on Joshua with people in churches and with students in classes reflect similar shaping—and similar moral queasiness at the thought of God mandating the annihilation of the Canaanites.

On the other hand, I confess some second thoughts on that conclusion. The fact is that the Bible clearly claims that God in fact ordered such a policy. Further, theologically I affirm, with Psalm 24:1, that “the earth is the LORD’s, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it.” I accept without qualms the claim of Psalm 104:29 that God may occasionally terrify people and deprive them of breath. Frankly, in my view such verses imply that, as Creator, God owns all lands and all their populations and, hence, can do with lands and peoples as he pleases. I don’t like the idea—and neither do most people with whom I’ve discussed it—but the Bible seems unapologetic about reporting that God, for his own purposes, takes human life. It affirms that he even has the right to do so.

There’s something about Christian objections to God’s annihilation policy that also troubles me. Such objections seem to reflect our embarrassment over God’s violent actions, as if in so doing God had somehow misbehaved and offended us. In my ears, they remind me of a parent unhappy with a child for getting in a fist fight on the playground. I sense behind them some standard—some “Thou shalt not”—to which we expect God to conform and by which we feel justified in judging his “violations.” My hunch is that lurking behind such oft-voiced indignation stands our common human urge to play God. In other words, implicitly it claims, “Were we in charge, we’d do things differently, if not better.”

My study of Joshua has also led me to one other conclusion on the matter. The survival of Rahab and the Gibeonites attest that the annihilation policy was not an absolute one. In fact, literarily Joshua contrasts their receptive dealings with Israel with those of the kings who rally troops to annihilate Israel. As several scholars note, the book emphasizes that Israel rightly reciprocated such receptivity, whereas the rebellious kings were rightly routed. The book itself says such exceptions are “OK” in God’s eyes.

Further thoughts on this thorny subject must await another occasion. But for the record, let me state categorically where I stand on violence: I’m against it.

Bob Hubbard

This post was contributed by Paul Koptak, Paul and Bernice Brandle Prof. of Communications and Biblical Interpretation

Last year, students in the Biblical Preaching seminar discovered that there is much more to the Joseph story than a boy and his dreams. The course is based on the assumption that Genesis 37-50, the longest narrative in the Bible, is an example of biblical storytelling at its best, and that we learn to preach narrative texts by first learning how to read them. Students used the translation by E. Fox in The Five Books of Moses (The Schocken Bible, vol. 1. Schocken, 1995), and J. P. Fokkelman’s Reading Biblical Narrative: An Introductory Guide (WJKP, 1999) to look more closely at the use of narrative frames, key words and repetition to form questions that directed their research.

About half the class sessions were then given to sharing the questions and discoveries class members had written on their copies of the Genesis text or in their weekly journals. We had some lively and engaged discussions as the story came alive before our eyes and in our hearing. Class members were divided (as readers always are) on whether they liked Joseph, the “Lord of the Dreams” or did not. We went on to talk about issues of grace at work in flawed persons and troubled families.

We also talked about the move in the last few decades toward “narrative preaching,” reviewing its strengths (increased interest, emotional engagement, strategic use of indirection) and its shortcomings (ambiguity, lack of focus, and individualism, especially when it is overused). The class read and discussed Doug Lipman’s Improving Your Storytelling: Beyond the Basics for All Who Tell Stories in Work or Play, (August House, 1999. By the way Lipman’s website is worth a look along with his many seminars, one developed just for preachers). Students then took turns retelling one of the stories from Genesis 12-36, drawing out insights they had discovered in their reading and using Lipman’s suggestions for the telling.

Two books on preaching that we read had their strengths and shortcomings too: Steven D. Mathewson, The Art of Preaching Old Testament Narrative, (Baker, 2002), summarizes for evangelicals what the mainline churches have been doing for a while, and John W. Wright, Telling God’s Story: Narrative Preaching for Christian Formation (InterVarsity Press, 2007) insists that narrative preaching tell the whole biblical story of God’s calling forth a people for God’s purposes and glory. Each presented a welcome challenge to self-centered connections between the biblical narrative and “my story,” but the sermon examples did not always make a strong connection with either the text or the hearers.

So we made more progress in learning to read than in developing a method we could recommend for storytelling and preaching. Still, I remain confident that solid work with the first phase will inspire new and fresh ways to preach the story. I know I heard some very good sermons.

Paul Koptak

I’m not a fan of political conventions. They tend to be what media critic Daniel Boorstin called ‘pseudo-events.’ They are staged and scripted, produced and performed in order to garner media coverage. Here’s an example of the difference between a ‘pseudo-event’ and a real event. If my neighbor’s garage burns down because of errant bottle rockets, that’s an event. The news trucks show up because something real happened. But if my neighbor burns down her garage to get the news trucks to come, that’s a pseudo-event—a reality created just to grab some TV time.

Twice in the last month, the arsonists have struck. First the Democrats burned down their garage, with the news media dutifully covering the conflagration. And then the Republicans were all set to burn down their garage—with what they hoped was a bigger, better and certainly redder fire. But this second pseudo-event ran smack into hurricane Gustav. Hot air turned out to be far less interesting than dangerous air.

Of course by now everyone realizes that, as events go, Gustav was a bit of a letdown. Gustav failed to live up to the speculation about its devastating potential. (At least it failed to devastate New Orleans or other major US population centers. There’s no clearer sign of our national egocentricity than the fact that the devastating impact of Gustav on impoverished neighbors like Cuba has gone largely unnoticed.) In fact, Daniel Boorstin might point out that because Gustav got more news coverage as something that might happen than it did as an actual happening, it was more of a pseudo-event than a real one.

Why does any of this matter for Christians? First, because pseudo-events tempt us to lose sight of Jesus. The clamor and glitz of the pseudo-event disorient us from the still small voice of God (1 Kings 19:12) and from the Savior who “had no form or majesty that we should look at him” (Isaiah 53:2). So our sense of what is real and what really matters is shaped more by the news of today’s pseudo-events than by the good news about Jesus. Second, because pseudo-events lure us away from daily discipleship. They are so big and splashy that our everyday life begins to seem small and boring by comparison. Yet it is precisely here in the humdrum that Christ calls us to follow him. Finally, because pseudo-events distract and disengage us from serving our neighbors. They do this partly by taking our time; I can’t watch the political convention and mow my neighbor’s lawn at the same time. But they do it more by stultifying our imaginations. When is the last time you saw a pseudo-event that propelled you to active, loving service of your needy neighbor? Not the Oscars or the Golden Globes, not the Super Bowl half time show, nor a nominating convention either.

Which is why it is so interesting that the Republicans have curtailed their convention in favor of showing concern for and giving attention to the potential victims of Gustav. (And to be fair, the Democrats have worked just as hard to parade their concern for Cajuns in front of the camera.) Perhaps this is one of those rare moments when the collision of human need and neighborly concern bring out our best, transforming even a pseudo-event like a nominating convention into a call to something that looks quite a bit like loving service. If so, I’m glad. But I’m not going to pin my hope for substantive change on that kind of politics, because it remains far too uncommon, and far too unreflective. And more than that, I’m not going to pin my hopes there because my hope—all of it—has already been claimed by and for Christ.

Of course, that doesn’t mean I can’t engage in local politics nor wish that the American political process were less addicted to the pseudo-event and more committed to substantive change. In the aftermath of Gustav, what I’d really like to see, what we could really use, is a thick public policy discussion about the viability of building (and rebuilding) an entire city below sea level. Surely it’s time for somebody to point out just how crazy it is to try to fence out the sea. That’s what we need, but that’s almost certainly not what we’ll get. Why? Because we don’t find substantive discussion of complex issues nearly as interesting as pseudo-events, and because Hurricane Hanna is already heading toward the Atlantic coast.

Brent Laytham

Professor of Theology and Ethics

North Park Theological Seminary

The Bible, North Park, and the Annual Meeting

The focus of the recently completed Covenant Annual Meeting was the centrality of Scripture. A point made over and over again during the conference was that it is not enough to simply value Scripture. For the Bible to truly be central to our existence as God’s people we must read it with rigor and dogged determination. As John Weborg put it in his magnificent sermon on the first night of the meeting, we must not become mere consumers, picking this bit and that bit from the Scriptures according to our interests and prejudices. Rather we should see the Scripture as capital, as an ever renewed and ever renewing resource for our communal and individual lives. And we must read it together. Our private interpretations are not enough. “What the Bible means to me” is not enough. Competent reading of the Bible is communal reading. And communal reading is not only a contemporary reading, but listens to the readings of the past. Competent Bible reading “gives the dead a vote”. (Please see my “The Bible, Culture, and Mission” in the May 2008 Covenant Quarterly for an expansion of these themes). If you did not hear John’s sermon, go online and listen to it. It is among the best sermons I have ever heard.

North Park’s Stephen Chester and Klyne Snodgrass continued the conversation about reading Scripture. Stephen provided an excellent workshop for the pastors on reading Paul according to the great Apostles own parameters. Stephen also had us reading together, engaging some of Paul’s more difficult texts in groups of three or four. Paul was a master at taking the Hebrew Scriptures and the life and teaching of Jesus and applying it to very different cultural situations. This is a task we face every time we preach or teach or share our lives and faith. Klyne lead the Annual Meetings discussion of the new Covenant teaching paper on how the ECC reads Scripture. North Park alum Becky Eklund, who just finished the first year of her ThD studies at Duke Divinity School, also contributed to the discussion. The paper was very well received. If you haven’t had a chance to read it, go to the Covenant website and take a look. As Klyne, Becky, and Donn Engebretson all said, there is nothing new in this paper. But it is a concise statement of our long-term commitments to reading well and living well from the Scriptures. One pastor said during the debate that he was delighted to have such a document for use in his congregation, especially with people who don’t quite understand what the Covenant is about. “Thank you,” he concluded, “for doing something useful for a change.” Another useful resource contributed to the discussion: the DVD series on Covenant Affirmations , funding by the Making Connections Initiative of the Lilly Endowment. Klyne was feature on that presentation as well.

I am proud of the Biblical field at North Park. With Klyne and Stephen, and Max Lee in New Testament and Bob Hubbard and Jim Bruckner in Old Testament I think we are second to none. Paul Koptak adds a course or two to the Old Testament field as well—particularly in Wisdom Literature. These are all excellent teachers and publishing scholars. Klyne’s Stories with Intent is now on the shelves of most Covenant pastors. Jim just published a new commentary on Exodus. Everybody else has something in the works for the near future. Max Lee is under contract for three books. We call max “Red Bull” for his legendary use of the energy drink to keep himself going during the completion of his dissertation. He must have a case of it at home right now!

In a few days I am heading on vacation and I am reading three fascinating books and will be carrying several others with me. I want to recommend our own David Olson’s The American Church in Crisis. I am going to be saying some more about this book in a column for the Covenant Companion. Most of the pastors received this book at the Midwinter Conference. Please take it off your shelf and read it. As strange as it may seem an Orthodox Rabbi friend of mine recommended the second book I am currently reading; Jesus of Nazareth by Pope Benedict XVI. The Pope is a scholar but writes as both a scholar and a pastor. It is well worth a look. I am also reading a book by Daniel Aleshire the executive director of the Association of Theological Schools.

One of my summer projects is to read on the future of the church and theological education in preparation for a year long listening tour designed to help us rethink our approach to ministerial preparation. Dan’s book, Earthen Vessels , reflects on that future and I suspect will be an important part of my preparation. Other books I will be taking with me on vacation are For Life Abundant , edited by Dorothy Bass and Craig Dykstra (another book on theological education), Finding Our Way Again, by Brian McLaren, and Surprised by Hope by N. T. Wright. If you think this all sounds a bit heavy, I am taking a few novels along as well!

Jay Phelan