Renounce

On November 15, 2016, in a speech given at Oxford Union, renowned physicist Stephen Hawking made a startling prediction. He said that he believed our days on this planet are numbered. Hawking stated that dire threats to humanity and to the planet, brought about by the clear and present dangers of global nuclear war, climate change, artificial intelligence, genetically engineered viruses, and other evil powers, threaten the existence of earth itself. He suggested that we have 1000 years to find another planet that might support human life, and he said that the longer human beings live on Earth, the higher the risk of Earth’s demise.

Well, I must say that even though I believe Stephen Hawking is a brilliant scientist, on this one, I’m going to put my trust in Jesus when he said, “But about that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but only the father” (Matthew 24:36, NRSV). No one, not even Jesus, can predict when the end will come, be it for us as individuals or for the world as we know it.

But at the same time, I can’t ignore the very real sins that Hawking points us to in his warning. And let us be clear: what we are talking about here is sin, pure and simple. It is a sin for human beings to contribute to the destruction of God’s creation. It would be the greatest dishonor to our creator that we could ever make, an irreversible and permanent mortal sin, if this earth were to be destroyed by our hands–we who were created in God’s image and given the responsibility to act as stewards of God’s magnificent creation. This isn’t a political position or my personal opinion. And in contrast to what Stephen Hawking said, I don’t believe this is just about the preservation of humanity. It is about the potential destruction of most, if not all, of life on this earth that we say we believe God has brought into being.

If, during the season after Epiphany, we set our focus on individual conversion—inviting people into a personal relationship with Jesus Christ—then during the season of Lent, we turn our attention to the communal dimensions of our faith. Over the next five weeks, we will explore what it means to make a commitment to join in the work of Christ in the world through baptism into the community of faith.

As my colleague Taylor Burton-Edwards has noted, Lent is traditionally a season set aside for preparing people to take the next step in the journey toward discipleship by being baptized into the body of Christ, the church. In United Methodism, baptism is not an act by an individual. We don’t perform private baptisms because, for us, baptism is not simply a mark of our personal profession of faith in Christ. Baptism is an act of the community of Christ. It is a covenant between an individual, Christ, and a community of faith, to live together as disciples and to give our whole lives over to being incorporated into the body of Christ. The focus is on the corporate nature of the ritual. In baptism, we make a commitment to hold one another accountable as disciples of Jesus Christ and to confess our sins, not just as individuals, but as human beings forging a life together, bound eternally by the Spirit of Christ.

Like American culture, American Protestant Christianity has always had a tendency to individualize the faith. We like to focus on our relationship with Jesus Christ, our individual salvation, and our personal sins. But historically, Christianity, in general, and United Methodism, in particular, has not placed the emphasis of our relationship to God through Christ so exclusively on the shoulders of the individual. And if there is any kernel of truth in what Stephen Hawking predicts about the future of life on Earth, I think it would behoove us all to return to our more communal roots when it comes to thinking about our baptismal vows.

Fortunately for us, the introduction to the Service of the Baptismal Covenant draws immediate attention to the communal nature of our ritual:

Through the Sacrament of Baptism
we are initiated into Christ's holy Church.
We are incorporated into God's mighty acts of salvation
and given new birth through water and the Spirit.
All this is God's gift, offered to us without price.

“The Services of the Baptismal Covenant of The United Methodist Church as Revised to Align with the 2008 Book of Discipline and Book of Resolutions,” Copyright © 2009, The United Methodist Publishing House. Published by The General Board of Discipleship with permission from The United Methodist Publishing House. Italics mine. All subsequent quotes marked SBC are from this source.

Mark Stamm, in his new booklet, The Meaning of Baptism in the United Methodist Church, says it this way: “Through baptism, we are born anew by the free gift of God and placed within this family called church” (Mark Stamm, The Meaning of Baptism in the United Methodist Church. Nashville: Discipleship Resources, 2017).

Community. Corporate. Family. Congregation. Church. These words all point clearly to our understanding that, for United Methodists, baptism is both individual and communal.

So as we begin our journey toward the baptismal font today, let us be reminded first and foremost that when we make our initial vow in front of the body of Christ when we are presented for Holy Baptism, to “renounce the spiritual forces of wickedness, reject the evil powers of this world, and repent of your sin,” (SBC) we are not just renouncing the spiritual forces that we struggle with as individuals. We are also rejecting the evil powers that are loose in the world. Likewise, we are not just repenting of our sins as individuals. We are also repenting of the sins of humankind as a whole.

Now, I have to confess here that in the past, when I have read the story of Jesus being tempted by the devil for forty days, I have, like a good American, tended to focus on what this story means in terms of how Jesus’ struggle with the temptations presented by the Devil apply to me as an individual. This time around, the Spirit and my colleagues have inspired me to consider what the temptation means for us not as individuals, but as the body of Christ. How can we understand the temptations in terms of our communal sin?

For simplicity’s sake, let me suggest that the three temptations faced by Jesus correspond to temptations we vow to renounce, reject, and repent of in our first baptismal vow. In his book, The Word before the Powers: An Ethic of Preaching, Charles Campbell portrays Jesus as a person whose entire ministry is about renouncing the spiritual forces of wickedness, rejecting the evil powers of this world, and repenting of our sinful behavior, both individual and corporate.

Walter Wink on the Domination System
by Dawn Chesser
Walter Wink develops his work in a trilogy of three books: Naming the Powers: The Language of Power in the New Testament (1984); Unmasking the Powers: The Invisible Forces That Determine Human Existence (1986); and Engaging the Powers: Discernment and Resistance in a World of Domination (1992). It is in the third book that he really begins to articulate his understanding of what he calls the “Domination System.”
[Read more]

Campbell interprets the story of the temptations in the wilderness in terms of Jesus’ resistance to what Walter Wink calls the evils of the “Domination System.”

Campbell paints the temptation story as the opening act of Jesus’ mission: his ministry, says Campbell, will be to resist the powers and principalities of the present world. Campbell notes that it is ultimately a ministry that will lead to crucifixion at the hands of these very same powers and principalities.

In this story the powers are given a name: “The Devil” and, later, “Satan.” Jesus’ response to the temptations presented by the Devil is clear and consistent. He says no. He resists by faithfully and steadfastly refusing to participate in the worldly system that allows some to dominate at the expense of others (see Charles Campbell, The Word before the Powers: And Ethic of Preaching. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2002., 44-48).

The first temptation that Jesus refuses is to use his power to preserve himself. Even though he has been fasting for forty days and is surely starving by now, he resists the Devil’s invitation to use his own power to turn stones into loaves of bread. Recalling his forebears in the wilderness, Jesus picks up the Scriptures. In his moment of greatest need, in order to survive, he turns to the Word of God as his weapon of choice, telling his tempter that “One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God” (Deuteronomy 8:3). “Like the people in the wilderness who lived on manna, Jesus affirms that dependence on God and obedience to God are more important than securing one’s own survival. . .Jesus says no to making his own survival the top priority and to using his power to meet his own needs” (Campbell, 46).

In the second temptation, the Devil tries to use Scripture itself, demonstrating that the Word of God can be used by the powers of this world in ways that are in direct opposition to the way of God. The Devil quotes Psalm 91:11-12, employing Scripture to tempt Jesus to manipulate God’s Word for his own selfish purposes. By suggesting that Jesus use this particular method as a demonstration of power—in which, for all the world to see, he would jump off the pinnacle of the Temple only to be rescued in the arms of angels, all captured live on every major news network—he would effectively show everyone that he would be exactly the kind of Messiah they wanted. He would be a leader who was willing to use God as a means to achieving his personal, spiritual, and even political goals.

"Hypage, Satana" ("Get thee behind me, Satan")
by Taylor Burton-Edwards
Much meaning is packed into the five Greek letters (upage) of the command Jesus gives at the end of his encounter with “the devil” after his forty days of fasting in the Judean desert. The verb is not only placed in imperative, here, but the verb itself is one that would be spoken by a person in authority, most commonly the commander of an army. [Read more]

And again Jesus remains resolute in his refusal to capitulate to the ways of the world. He will not test God, nor will he use God for his own gain. Once again taking up Scripture as his primary tool of resistance, he reminds his tempter of what is written: “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.”

The final temptation Jesus faces is to use his power to become a king, to willingly use violence to put himself at the top of the worldly Domination System. Again, I turn to Charles Campbell’s powerful interpretation.

“All of the kingdoms can be yours,” the devil tells Jesus, “[if you will just bow down to me and my ways], if you will just lord your power over others and take up the sword of the nations. Take charge of the biological weapons, deploy some troops, command the implementation of a ‘Star Wars’ missile defense system. All the kingdoms can be yours—if you will just use the world’s means of power: domination and violence” (Campbell, 46).

Again Jesus says no, wielding the sword of Scripture against his enemy: “For it is written, ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.’” He will not participate in the Domination System of the world. My goodness, he won’t even use his power of domination and violence to take out his tempter! He will follow the way of God even if it costs him his life.

And with that, Jesus orders Satan “away.” The power of the Domination System is quashed, at least for the moment.

But it’s not over, because we can’t consider this text apart from the cross. As Campbell summarizes,

In the temptation stories, the drama of the gospel is foreshadowed both by the powers and by Jesus. On their part, the powers must crucify Jesus because of the “No!” he speaks to their way. Intent on their own survival at all costs, the powers must crucify the one who threatens their authority. Committed to domination by the sword, the powers must put to death the one who challenges their most basic values. Making idols of themselves by using God for their own ends, the powers must crucify one who names their pretensions and serves God alone. On his part, Jesus takes up the way of the cross in the wilderness by rejecting the way of survival, domination, violence and idolatry, he takes his first step down the path to crucifixion. If Jesus had chosen the way of survival, he would have avoided crucifixion. If he had chosen the way of violent domination, he would not have succumbed to the cross. And if he had chosen to use God for his own ends—placing effectiveness over faithfulness—he would never have ended up at Golgotha (Campbell, 48).

What's at Stake in Today's Baptismal Questions
by Taylor Burton-Edwards
The baptismal questions for today have three active verbs: renounce, reject, and repent. These are not synonyms. Each is its own concrete action, with its own set of implications for how Christians will live our lives. [Read more]

It is an overthrowing of our own, sinful and distorted understanding of power, and a turning over of power structures, that we see in this story. And it is not just about kingdoms of the world. It is a part of all the temptations we face. Our individual choices always have systemic consequences. Jesus overturns what we see as signs of power and wealth: a full table, the attention of all the people, and even creation itself, bowing down before his power and might.

As noted above, this was not the end of it for Jesus. And it is not the end of it for us. The work of fighting the powers, resisting the Domination System— of renouncing the spiritual forces of wickedness, rejecting the evil powers of this world, and repenting of our sins—is ongoing work for each one of us. It isn’t one time. We have to continually resist the temptations of this world. We have to return to our baptismal roots again and again to remember what is at stake.

So the church takes this time every year to remind ourselves that we need to join Jesus in the resistance by fasting, and by meditating on God’s Word, and by holding one another accountable in Christian love and witness. We can’t skip over this step. We have to be with him and with one another in this journey toward what it means to be in a shared life together as the body of Christ.

Baptismal Tai-Chi
by Taylor Burton-Edwards
One of the ways I’ve been offering some practical, hands-on teaching about living our baptismal calling, both in MDiv classes and in retreats I lead focused on this very topic, has been to teach a set of movements, coordinated to the baptismal questions, that I’ve come to call “Baptismal Tai-Chi.” [Read more]

The good news in this story is that the power of God in Christ is stronger than the power of Satan. The power of good always triumphs over the power of evil, and the power of life—of resurrection—trumps the power of death and destruction every time. There is hope for our future despite the spiritual forces of wickedness and evil powers of this world that we must fight against.

As we move through this season, let us recommit ourselves to joining with Jesus in living out God’s mission to fight against the powers and principalities that would seek to destroy not just us, but this world and everything in it.

Walter Wink on the Domination System

by the Rev. Dr. Dawn Chesser

Walter Wink develops his work in a trilogy of three books: Naming the Powers: The Language of Power in the New Testament (1984); Unmasking the Powers: The Invisible Forces That Determine Human Existence (1986); and Engaging the Powers: Discernment and Resistance in a World of Domination (1992). It is in the third book that he really begins to articulate his understanding of what he calls the “Domination System.”

Wink imagines the “principalities and powers” so often referred to in the Bible as being largely impersonal. They are part of our culture. They are embedded in our institutions. They are the pool in which we all swim. In the ancient world people encountered them in the institutional forms of Roman life: legions, governors, crucifixions, payment of tribute, Roman sacred emblem and standards (Walter Wink, Engaging the Powers: Discernment and Resistance in a World of Domination. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1992. 7). In Nazi Germany, people spoke of the palpable evil in the “air,” a pervading “atmosphere that hung over the land and filled the world with foreboding and menace (Wink, 8). We might speak today of the awful terror we felt, something that just wouldn’t go away, after 9/11. Or we might talk about the “spirit” of evil that has led people to respond by organizing through groups such as Black Lives Matter. While we might use personal words to speak of evil—Satan, demons, evil spirits, bad juju—what we are describing is not personal. It is systemic. It is a collective feeling, an experience of something that we know is bad, and that we fear, and that is powerful, and that we must fight against. But ultimately, we may have difficulty locating the specific source of this power. Nevertheless, it is real. We experience it in the world, and we as human beings must contend with it. When these “powers” that we feel become organized into a particular worldview, then the “evil” can become associated with a particular group. We divide ourselves into good and evil, saints and sinners, righteous and unrighteous. Evil gets projected on others, until finally our “demons” devolve into “isms”: racism, sexism, political or religious oppression, patriarchy, militarism, corporate greed, xenophobia, ecological destruction:

“I use the expression ‘the Domination System’ to indicate what happens when an entire network of Powers becomes integrated around idolatrous values. And I refer to ‘Satan’ as the world-encompassing spirit of the Domination System. . .” (Wink)

He goes on to give an example:

“Think. . . of a riot at a soccer game, in which, for a few frenzied minutes, people who in their ordinary lies behave quite decently on the whole suddenly find themselves bludgeoning and even killing opponents whose only sin was rooting for the other team. Afterwards people often act bewildered, and wonder what could have possessed them. Was it a Riot Demon that leaped upon them from the sky, or was it something intrinsic to the social situation: a ‘spirituality’ that crystallized suddenly, precipitated by the conjunction of an outer permissiveness, heavy drinking, a violent ethos, a triggering incident, and the inner violence of the fans? And when the riot subsides, does the Riot Demon rocket back to heaven, or does the spirituality of the rioters simply dissipate as they are scattered, subdued, or arrested?” (Wink)

"Hypage, Satana" ("Get thee behind me, Satan")

by Taylor Burton-Edwards

Much meaning is packed into the five Greek letters (upage) of the command Jesus gives at the end of his encounter with “the devil” after his forty days of fasting in the Judean desert. The verb is not only placed in imperative, here, but the verb itself is one that would be spoken by a person in authority, most commonly the commander of an army.

This is most telling in the immediate context. It is the devil who has offered Jesus “all the kingdoms in the world and their glory,” yet it is Jesus who comes back with a command as from a commander. “Begone!” or “Get out!” or “Away with you!” or drawing on the transitive usage of this verb, “Get back in line, under my authority!”

The devil withdraws. And, as further confirmation of the authority of Jesus, at that very moment, the heavenly host (God’s “angel army”) appears around Jesus, attending to his needs.

What’s at Stake in Today’s Baptismal Questions

by Taylor Burton-Edwards
The baptismal questions for today have three active verbs: renounce, reject, and repent. These are not synonyms. Each is its own concrete action, with its own set of implications for how Christians will live our lives.

To renounce is a fundamental act of treason. It is to break allegiance to a power or authority to which one had previously given allegiance and service. From the earliest examples of baptismal questions we have, renunciation of Satan or the devil (spiritual forces of wickedness, we say) always comes first.

This is no accident. If follows biblical precedent. The very first story we hear of Jesus after his baptism in the wilderness is his renunciation of Satan. Jesus makes it clear where his allegiances lie, and he shows the way for all who would follow him.

It also follows the pattern of centuries of practice when one seeks citizenship in a new realm or country. One first breaks allegiance to the realm or sovereign of the people from which one has come and only then is in a position to pledge allegiance to the new realm or sovereign.

To reject the evil powers of this world is a phrase that draws on exorcistic language. Our English word “reject” comes from the Latin “reicere,” which means “to throw out”-- and so translates the Greek verb “ekballein,” which is used fairly consistently to describe what Jesus does to demons (to cast out, to throw out). We here pledge to do more than not do evil things. We pledge to throw out, to cast out, to shut the door behind any evil powers that seek to operate with us or through us. So we not only break allegiances, we also commit not to allow evil any sway in our lives.

To repent of our sin (note the singular!) means more than feeling sorry or remorseful or guilty for bad things we may have done. The Hebrew verb behind repent (shuv) means “to turn from.” Further, the pledge we make is not simply to turn from “sins” (concrete actions that bring harm) but “sin” itself. The singular points less to individual actions and more toward whole patterns of life. So we here commit to turn and walk away from those patterns of life, habits, and behaviors that damage others and/or our relationships with God, earth, and neighbor.

Obviously, our actions pledging renunciation, rejection, and repentance in this first baptismal question are not completed in the act of baptism itself, even as our salvation is not brought to fruition there. Rather, as baptism initiates us, gets us started in the divine life, so also these questions represent our pledge to get started on renouncing spiritual forces of wickedness, rejecting evil powers of the world, and repenting of sin. These vows about baptism, as all of the baptismal vows, mark the beginning of “a long obedience in the same direction” (Nietszche, Beyond Good and Evil, Chapter 5: https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/n/nietzsche/friedrich/n67b/chapter5.html)

But we shall never even get to the beginning of that “long obedience” if we are not first helping people learn the essential practices necessary to develop the disciplines of such renunciation, rejection, and repentance in their own lives. These include fasting, in whatever form people may practice such abstinence. Lent is the season in the Christian year when we as church commit to offering such practical, hands-on teaching with Jesus as our model and the Spirit as our guide.

Baptismal Tai-Chi

by Taylor Burton-Edwards

One of the ways I’ve been offering some practical, hands-on teaching about living our baptismal calling, both in MDiv classes and in retreats I lead focused on this very topic, has been to teach a set of movements, coordinated to the baptismal questions, that I’ve come to call “Baptismal Tai-Chi.” (For students of Tai-Chi out there, I know this is not Tai-Chi. It’s a convenient label, that is all.)

When I teach this series of movements to others, I always start with getting the movements down-- beginning to get the actions into muscle memory, as it were. Then, and only then, I add the words of our baptismal questions. We keep practicing it together throughout the class (before and after each class in the case of seminary classes) or retreat (several times a day, every day of the retreat).

Here are two videos that demonstrate it. If you find it helpful as a tool for your congregation, by all means use it.

Baptismal Tai-Chi at Drew University

Baptismal Tai-Chi at Dinosaur State Park