Fundamentalism (An Allegory)

There is a tall mountain. It reaches to the heavens; you could say, to God himself. It is a series of rolling ridges, each ridge higher than the next. This mountain, far from being a heap of rock, is well-watered – lush and green. The source of its fertility is a rushing spring – a spring that flows down the mountainside from a lake at the peak. The lake is fed by the sky: the rain and mist are constantly refreshing its waterline. And from the very beginning of time, people have come to this mountain to drink from its waters and live among its rejuvenating flora and fauna.

There is a village on the mountainside. There are also various kinds of settlements all over the mountain – camps, clubs, resorts, cabins, tent cities, etc. – but this village is of particular interest. It is built directly over the foaming spring; its waters run through the town centre as a sparkling canal. Bridges span the waterway, over which the townspeople travel, stopping frequently to gaze into the spring below. Communal pools dot its edges, where families frolic together in the summer heat; fountains gush its elixir into the streets from deep and elegant cisterns, where children splash and play; the pumphouse siphons the spring’s liquid crystal directly into every home of the village, where both the young and old drink and wash of its freshness daily. It is an old village, and well-built; its stately brick structures, chiseled into the mountain bedrock, bespeak of Founders who sought to establish a place that would stand the test of time, never straying from its source of life: the spring, that source fed from the sky. The house of government, the schoolhouse, the publishing house, the millhouse, the boardinghouse, and from house to house, each facet of the village lives, breathes, and thanks God for the spring, and for the Founders who had anchored their village in its path on this mountain peak.

One day, a day like any other, a group of curiously-dressed travelers came into the village from below. They were welcomed warmly by the villagers, who gave them lodging and refreshment, bathing them and quenching their thirst with the fruits of the spring. The villagers were always happy to receive newcomers into their streets and homes. The travelers showed their appreciation to the villagers, and an amicable relationship grew over the days that the travelers refreshed themselves after their long journey up the mountainside. One night, after a rousing meeting filled with music and drink from the source, the conversation at the head table, where the village governor sat with the travelers, turned to the travelers’ strange dress and the purpose of their visit to the peak village. As the villagers listened and looked on, the governor queried the newcomers.

“Your manner of dress is like none we have ever seen. Your people must be from a far and strange place, with your boxes filled with light and your large coloured charts, your ropes and hammers and shiny cloaks.”

“Well, out attire is not the normal dress of our people. This is our native country’s best exploration gear: global positioning devices, satellite mapping charts, crampons, nylon ropes, karabiners, Gore-Tex, flashlights and flares, first-aid, waterproof tents, and everything else we will need for our journey.” One of the travelers held out their gear for the villagers to see.

“After all, we are exploring the mountain,” another traveler added. The villagers chuckled, gazing on the strange explorers with fascination and now, slight pity. Quickly, the governor corrected her.

“You mean, you have explored the mountain.”

“No, no, dear sir. We are only just beginning!” The villagers chuckled again, some shaking their heads.

The governor beamed. “I hope you will not be disappointed, but thrilled, at the following news, my friends: I am pleased to inform you that you have reached the peak, weary travelers! You have arrived!” The faces of the governor and townspeople glowed with earnest joy at their chance to break the news. There was a smattering of applause, and the governor proudly threw his arm around one of the explorers. But the explorers looked perplexed.

“But… the mountain is vast, and reaches higher than any man or woman can reach! Surely you know this,” one of the explorers stammered.

“Surely you are sending out your own teams –” another trailed off.

The governor merely laughed. “And surely you can see that we are at the mountain’s peak, and firmly planted on the spring – the source of all good things,” he spoke confidently, raising a glass of shimmering springwater into the air. “Our Founders, in their wisdom, several hundreds of years ago placed us here, on this, the solid rock!” The others where cheering now.

The explorers looked apologetic. One of them spoke. “Friends, your have an incredibly beautiful village, a village that has sustained itself for a hundred years and will perhaps sustain itself for a hundred more. And we have enjoyed our stay immensely, But –”

“But…?”

“But this is only a peak.” His eyes fell as the villagers gasped and a rumbling moved through those assembled.

“A peak?” The governor’s face reddened. One of the explorers held out a chart.

“Look at the satellite images, good sir. Pictures from the sky. And we have laser readings from the base of the mountain, as well. The latest technology. The mountain is infinitely higher than any of your Founders could have known. It ascends into the clouds, beyond any possible instrumental reading. The knowledge and technology of a hundred years ago, much advanced in their time indeed, perhaps led your Founders to believe that this was the peak. But new charts, new maps, and new instruments show that our journey is not over by any means. The extent of the mountain’s vertical ascent has been heretofore unknown.”

“And that is why we must climb, and always be climbing.”

The villagers were restless with a growing unease. Some looked at one another with amazement, and some gnashed their teeth indignantly. Others arose and slipped away to their houses.

“We have lived on this mountain our whole lives.” A village elder stepped forward. “We have drunk from its springs and read, read, and reread the journals and maps of our forefather-Founders. There is not one among us who is not utterly convicted of and devoted to the truth of the spring and the wisdom of our Founders - that our village is at the mountaintop and our spring is the purest source.” The villagers clapped in agreement. But the explorer held out his hand, offering one and all to investigate the dozens of photographs, distance readings, weather mappings, course charts, and satellite images he held out to them.

“What are those to us?” a villager cried out. “Your bag of information is from below the mountain, from the plains! We have our spring, and we have our Founders, and we have the revelation that we have arrived. You are deluded by your knowledge, o travelers!”

The governor interjected, smiling to the explorers. “Allow us to teach you our ways, good friends. You can drink of our spring daily and study the writings of our Founders. Then you will see that it is good and right. Then you will know that your ascent is accomplished.” Just then, one of the quieter explorers removed his wide, brimmed hat and stepped forward into the light.

“Good evening, brothers and sisters.” When he spoke, there was a collective gasp among the crowd. “Many of you will recognize me.”

The governor collected himself. “You have come back.”

“I have come along,” he replied. “It has been many years since I left this place. But as you know, I grew up as one of you. I drank and bathed in the spring, and studied at the feet of the teachers of the Founders. Life was simple, and I had all I needed. Until one day.”

“Would that be the day you left us for the pleasures of the plains below?” The governor glared. All eyes were on the young traveler.

“No, sir. That would be the day I went for a walk.”

“Ah. Your first mistake. The writings of the Founders teach not to stray from the village. Had you listened to your teachers - ”

“The teachers call us to solitude. I went on my walk because of the teaching.” The crowd was silent. The governor stepped back. The traveler continued, “On my walk, I found a cave, the mouth of which is easy enough to find, if only one would…”, he paused, “…take a walk. And from the mouth of that cave rushed the spring you all love so dearly.” The villagers erupted in opposition, some shouting that there was no cave, others questioning the motive of his walk, and others reciting the writings of the Founders.

“Our spring is fed from the sky, boy. From the rains of heaven. Not from some cave upstream. So say the Founders. Besides, I have never seen any cave,” the governor said.

“But have you ever taken a walk?” the explorer asked. The governor burned. The young explorer turned and addressed the crowd again. “When I found that cave and the upstream source, it shattered my world. It meant that there was a world above this village that remained unexplored. Worse, it remained willfully unexplored. I tried to talk about it with some of you – tried to discuss what I had found – but I was told to keep silent, to return to the writings of the Founders, to drink and bathe more frequently from our spring.”

“And did you?” The governor asked briskly.

“I tried. But the knowledge of a higher source compelled me. I thought about it day and night. I could no longer live in a village of artificial boundaries, a village whose sole ideal is the lack of exploration and the lack of discovery. I wanted to climb. I wanted to experience an even purer spring. But, not knowing how to scale a mountain or having the tools necessary to conquer the peaks above this one, I left you all, not ascending, but descending. For a time, I floundered there, until I met others, like me, who gazed upon this mountain from a distance and felt its call. I have spent these last few years learning the techniques needed to understand the rushing spring and the intricacies of this sweeping mountain. We –” he gestured to the explorers, and then to the villagers, “we are all on a journey. To the source. The highest source. The purest spring. And the only way to do that is to improve our ability to climb – to redraw our maps, to observe the wind and the clouds, and to analyze the steep mountain face using every possible facet of our innovation….” Again, the din of the crowd swallowed up his words. The governor stepped forward, gesturing for silence.

“We can see the implements of exploration here, hanging off the bodies of these travelers – their maps, charts, technology. Some of you may even be curious. But I ask you this: why is it that we do not have these things, we who live on this mountain? We who live by the spring, have we ever seen a satellite image or a ‘Gore-Tek’ boot? No! And so I ask you, why would we need these things, these, the collective knowledge of men? Our spring is pure and the teachings of our Founders inspired. The knowledge and instruments of these travelers merely delude them, not only into believing that there is more to know about this mountain, but also that we – the Village on Peakspring – could be in error!” A murmur broke out among the villagers, some covered their own ears, others their own eyes, and some burst into song and chant. Just then, another explorer reached into her pack, and pulled out a jar. The noise stopped. The jar shimmered in the lights of the village. The place grew silent.

“Well, what is it?” someone called.

“This is a flask of spring water.”

“Our spring water? Water from Peakspring?”

“Everyone’s spring water. And no, it is from further up the mountain, collected on one of our scouting sorties before we arrived here. It is even purer than the water of your village. We tested it using our instruments. I invite you to run a test on it yourselves using your own.”

The governor quickly spoke. “We have no need of testing instruments, ma’am.”

Now it was the explorers’ turn to gasp. “No need of testing instruments? I don’t understand. How do you test your water here, to ensure that it is even fit to drink?”

The people of Peakspring laughed. “Why would we have need of today’s devices, when our village was founded from times of old on the purest source that could be found?”

“Why, to ensure that it has not been contaminated since then over time!”

“When you are founded at the source, there is no need of such testing, no need of such technologies, devised to undermine the spring’s veracity.”

“There instruments are devised to do no such thing! On the contrary, they are devised to guard against contamination! All our knowledge, studies, technologies, instruments help us get closer to the source, not farther! And besides, here,” she gestured towards the stuffed rucksack of charts and maps, “here is all the evidence you need that you are not established on the source! There are miles of spring above you! Does this not concern you in the least?”

The governor smiled. “Sure,” He walked slowly to the edge of the platform, addressing the explorers, but speaking to the villagers, “sure, you can use your instruments and your knowledge to find something you can’t find here. And you can drink whatever water you find, miles and miles above us, or so you may claim. But we have no use of your water here. We have our spring. And we have our teaching that says we have been founded on the highest peak at the source of that stream. We are convicted, convinced, and committed, and there is nothing that anyone can ever say, despite all your ‘evidence’ to move us from this place!” Applause. Music.

The following day, the explorers left that village. In the days and years to follow, a well-beaten trail formed just outside the borders of Peakspring (now ironically named). Dozens, then hundreds, then thousands of explorers traveled the narrow dirt path that led to the mountain’s heights. Constant reports issued news from the top: a new pool has been found, a new peak has been reached, a greater understanding has followed. Ever-purer springs have been uncovered, with samples brought to the mountain’s lower settlements so that its inhabitants can taste and see for themselves.

As for Peakspring, its former fence has been renovated into a high wall. Its villagers have never stopped insisting that their spring water is the purest, and that their Founders knew all that was and is to be known. It is a dynamic place, though: some explorers settle there, tired of their perplexing journeys. Some leave, looking for a better life off the mountain. Some deny the very existence of the little path outside the village and insist that the Founders be respected. Others mock the explorers for their learning as they pass. But there are still those villagers who go for a walk. And when they do, what they find changes everything.

To Hell with Revelation - Part 1 of 3

A primer on the book of Revelation, the Christians’ source of “hell”: to form any kind of theology from apocalyptic literature is to step outside of its express intent. Apocalyptic literature was a widely-circulating genre among the Jewish writers of the Roman occupation; we can read dozens of apocalyptic letters from the same period that John wrote his Revelation.

What’s even more important is that there are four ways to read/interpret Revelation, and everyone finds themselves in one of the four camps.

1) The Preterist says that the entire book is a veiled allegory of all of human history, and that Revelation ends with Jesus’ coming to Bethlehem. In other words, Revelation is a book of the history of God and the world up to the first century and not beyond, and John wrote in the apocalyptic style to protect his readers from Roman arrest. Revelation is so indiscernible that no Roman inquisitor could possibly accuse and prosecute the bearer of Revelation as a harbinger of Christian propaganda, and that was John’s intent.

2) The Historicist views Revelation as a history of the Christian church, spanning the events from Bethlehem through to the Second Coming of the future. Historicists look to apply specific verses and metaphorical images in the text to world events of the past.

3) The Futurist believes that Revelation is an account of the end times leading up to the Second Coming; that it only applies to the years and days leading up to the end of the world. It is a description of future events that could happen at any time, and most adherents of this view insist that “we are in the last days” right now.

4) The Idealist states that Revelation is not about real facts in any sense. It does not attempt to depict real events, but to provide encouragement to all believers of all ages and epochs. It can effectively be interpreted through any culture and time as an exhortation about the triumph of Christ.

Okay, with all that said, I reiterate: we have no idea how to read Revelation. Each of the four camps is a completely legitimate possibility; it has been said that John himself could have been a preterist, a historicist, a futurist, or an idealist. We have no way of knowing. Despite what you might hear from Jack Van Impe or Pat Robertson, there is no way that a person in one camp can say the other camp is wrong. And that’s where our churches (and televangelists) have usually stepped in and told us how to read it. Most denominations have chosen one stance and expected their pastors to teach Revelation through that lens.

I was raised a futurist, and it was touted by my church and pastor as the only true way to read Revelation. I had no idea that three other perfectly credible readings existed. Now I tend towards preterism, but I realize that the three other readings are perfectly legitimate as well. This awareness prevents me – precludes me – from creating doctrines and theological assumptions from Revelation. It leads me, I hope, to humility.

And so we are left to study the language. Much of the doctrine of “hell” comes from the four verses in Revelation that mention it. In the Greek, the word John uses (translated as the English “hell”) is “Hades” – a word that appears only 11 times in the entire New Testament.

Try to imagine the problem presented for the writers of the Gospels, especially for John and Luke, as they wrote their works in the Greek language. They were Hebraic Jews raised in orthodox Judaism, whose idea of death and the afterlife derived from the Old Testament, with possible contemporary influence from the debates between the competing Jewish sects, the Pharisees and Sadducees.

The historical Hebrew view of the afterlife is seen in the Old Testament Hebrew word “Sheol”, which is never described as an actual place (with not even the hint of eternal torture), but merely the state of being dead. This was a very Jewish idea, and dictates the entire theology of death in the Hebrew Scriptures. You die, and you experience “Sheol” – death and dying, the state of being dead. Nothing more – nothing “after”(life).

But as it turned out, these Hebraic Jews (the Bible writers) and new followers of Jesus found themselves writing in Greek, the dominant language of the Roman Empire, a culture which had a radically different view of the afterlife, with its legends of the underworld and of the guardian of the dead and Hades and the three-headed hound, etc. The only word for the afterlife in Greek was “Hades”; the idea of the Hebrew Sheol didn’t exist in Greek thought, and there was no word for Sheol in Greek.

So the New Testament writers substituted the Hebrew word and idea of “Sheol” with the Greek word (but not the idea) of “Hades”. They likely didn’t foresee a problem emerging for Jewish readers; orthodox Jews didn’t buy into the pagan Greek mythical stories of Hades anyway. There was no risk of confusion there. It was well-established in Old Testament Scripture that the wages of sin was death, but that keeping the law brought prosperity. New Testament Scripture furthered/amended this notion by proclaiming that God grants eternal life through belief in Jesus of Nazareth. The Greek myth and the Christian doctrine were incompatible, so surely never the twain would meet. Or were they, and would they?

As the church expanded, it spears to have become more and more Greek as the centuries unfolded, and the influence of Greco-Roman culture prevailed in the four hundred years after Christ. Christians began not to take “Hades” as a mere word-substitution, but actually co-opted much of the pagan Greek myth stories of “Hades” as well: it is a place where evil, unbelieving souls go, a place of torment. It would have been inconceivable to the early Jewish writers. But as the dance between Christian theology and Greek philosophy unfolded, we Christians added our own twist: (our) Jesus can save you from (Greek) hell.

It was a kind of subconscious Greco-Christian fusion that would influence how we read (into) Scripture for two thousand of years.

And so we come to see how “Hades” is used in Revelation. “Hades” is used four times in Revelation, and each time it appears, it is always next to the word “death” – “hell and death”, “death and hell” in 1:18, 6:8, 20:13, and 20:14. Without exception. Let’s explore each of the four cases. The other 7 cases will be discussed in the two posts to follow in coming weeks.

In Rev. 1:8, the first instance, Jesus holds the keys to hell and death. Is this a place of eternal torture that Jesus holds the keys to? Note that he holds the keys to death – an ontological state, an event that occurs as a result of the biblical Fall account. None would argue that “death” is a place. So does Jesus also hold the keys to a place of eternal torture in addition to those of death? A key to death and a key to hell? Two keys? One a key to a place and one a key to a state of being? Just how many keys does Jesus have up his sleeve, anyway?

We have been taught that death is a state and hell is a place, but it makes no logical sense. Jesus’ “holding the keys” means he overrides death and overrides “Hades/Sheol”. Understanding this in the Hebrew sense, Jesus trumps “the human state of dying and being destructible/mortal”.

And doesn’t this fit perfectly with what John wrote in his gospel at 3:16? “…Whosoever believes in him will not die, but have eternal life” (emphasis mine). What’s happened since this was written in the first century? Why have churches changed John’s good news? Why do preachers supplant John and declare, “Whoever believes in Christ will not live eternally in hell, but live eternally in heaven.”

We see further evidence of “death and hell” as an ontological human state in its second mention in Rev. 6:8. The pale-horse rider is followed by “death and Hades”, and these forces are poured out on the earth. Hell is not a place, but a human condition – a state or reality that we find ourselves in. War is hell. Disease is hell. Famine is hell. Death is hell. Look around you. I’d say the horseman has been riding rough-shod over humanity for a few millennia now. We don’t go to his cosmic ranch one day. He’s been visiting. His feet are up on the coffee table.

In Rev. 20:13, the third instance, “death and hell” deliver up the dead that are in them. Maybe we get the idea that hell is a place because there are dead “in” death and hell in this verse, but remember, we’ve been asking: is death a place? No. So why would we conceive of “Hades” being a place? Remember, in the thousands of years before the Greek “Hades”, Sheol was not a place, but a state of being dead. It seems to have been for John as well, because he always links death and hell together.

Never linked with torture. Never linked with a location. Never linked with the devil. Never linked with souls.

Where did we get all that? We got it from the Greek influence – the baggage that came with the single word “Hades”. Not from any teaching. After all, neither John the Baptist, nor Paul, nor Peter, nor Stephen, nor James nor any of the Christian teachers in all the preaching that goes on in Acts ever once mention the word “Hades” in any sermon, lecture, or defense. Ever. It’s an idea that they just didn’t have. Or if they did know about it, they didn't believe it, let alone preach it. It’s an idea that Greco-Roman church tradition accidentally created after the church fathers were too dead to rail against the notion.

The fourth and final reference is in Rev. 20:14, where “death and hell” are cast into the “lake of fire”. Now, let’s pause a moment. Imagine you had never heard the typical Christian message. Say, you are a native of a remote, isolated culture - a farmer in Papua New Guinea. I meet you, and as we are talking I give you an image: a “lake of fire”. What do you imagine? What do you see? You see a destitute place – a place where nothing survives, a place that has killed all the animals, people, plants, and devoured all buildings and man-made things of all kinds. A “lake of fire”, you would think – a place of total destruction where nothing survives. Fire: society’s enemy – people’s very livelihood eradicated. Life lost. This is no less true for the Papua New Guinean farmer than for the Manhattan bagel baker.

So, where do we get the idea that in the lake of fire anything survives? After all, 20:14 clarifies this image as a “Second Death”. Death delivers up its dead, they are judged once and for all, and delivered again to a metaphorical “lake of fire” (if everything else in Revelation is a metaphor – beasts, lambs, garments, whores, trees – why do we take this as a literal place?). John would never have used the image of fire if he were trying to depict a place of survival. It’s inconceivable.

If we are to be consistent with our imagery in Revelation, a “beast” is a strong scary thing, a “lamb” is a small weak thing, a “sword” is a sharp cutting thing, “gold” is a very valuable thing, and “fire” is… a place where things are consigned and survive forever in pain?

No.

Any creative writing student who decided to use a lake of fire as an image for conveying long-term preservation would probably be referred to a tutor at best, quietly failed at worst. Our doctrine of eternal punishment confirms that either we think John was a lousy poet or just plain stupid. If we are to be consistent or even just honest with ourselves, fire is an image of total destruction. Let’s give John a little credit.

Ask yourself: has my Greek mythological worldview impaired my ability to understand simple imagery?

As a side note, the “lake of fire” is mentioned in a total of four places in Revelation. Once in 20:13, and once in 20:14 as we discussed above. But maybe we get our images of eternal torture from the two other instances of “lake of fire”. In 19:20, the “beast” and “false prophet” are cast into the lake of fire. Do they survive? What would the Papuan farmer think? What did John think? What do you think? Are we in agreement?

In 20:10, the devil is also cast into the lake of fire. Here many translations say, “…the lake of fire, where the beast and the false prophet [are].” But a careful reading of John’s original manuscript shows that the verb “are” has been added after the fact. The original says merely, “…The lake of fire, where the beast and the false prophet.” Translators have added “are” to suit traditional theology. But it doesn’t even fit the textual flow of thought. In keeping with the previous chapter and a common-sense approach to a lake brimming with pure flame, it just has to be read, “Where the beast and false prophet were” or “had been thrown.” Regardless, the only one for whom eternal torment is even hinted at is the immortal devil. No one else. Especially not people or their souls.

It’s time for the next Christians to reverse the trend. It’s too easy – mindless, actually – to bend Scripture within the frame of one’s own worldview. And it’s been going on too long. It seems that the only people to give “hell” some serious thought have been intelligent, rational non-Christians. Does becoming a Christian mean mindlessly swallowing the pill that others refuse to even put in their mouths? Maybe it’s time we all carefully read the prescription together.

Here’s the great emerging irony: anyone who scrutinizes Scripture and tries to reframe tradition will face the criticism of having a “low view of Scripture.” But it’s hard to reconcile a Scripturally-absent doctrine of eternal hell, a chronocentric re-interpretation of John’s work, and a patronizing tradition of passive acceptance with the notion of a “high view of Scripture.”

The highest honour I can give Scripture and its writers is to read them without putting words and ideas on the page that aren’t there. It’s to investigate everything I read in the light of the “evangelion” – the good news. Reading Revelation through the lens of John’s other work – his gospel – not only removes the poison from the well of evangelion, but also clarifies Revelation's meaning. Jesus ushers in a “lake of fire” for death and hell; he holds a key ring to death and hell.

What Scripture is saying is this: death and hell/Sheol/grave/dying are annihilated if I freely choose life.

Now that’s good news worth believing. And even worth telling.

To Hell with Hell - Prologue

“I’ve got good news and bad news. What do you want first?”

“Do you want to hear about the benefits of believing in Jesus, or the penalty for not believing?”

It’s the conundrum of well-intentioned (and not-so-well-intentioned) Jesus people everywhere: which do we talk about first, hell or salvation? The good news or the bad news?

Well, I’ll step up and give you the good news first: there is no bad news.

Oh, don’t get me wrong: there’s lots of bad, but there’s no bad news. There’s no secret to let anyone in on.

“Tell me why I should believe in this Jesus.”

“Gee, well… where do I start? First of all, there’s this place called hell, and it’s where everyone’s going after they die. By default. But Jesus came to save everyone from there. He doesn’t want anyone to go there.”

“Then why doesn’t he just do away with it?”

“It’s a long story. In a nutshell, he made hell for the devil, but then decided that’s where some people will go. Or their souls, anyway. Well, he didn’t decide it, but they send themselves there. Well, not send, but they end up there. Anyway, Jesus came to save you. To save you from your sins. Because your sins are taking you to hell after you die. Trust me, you don’t want to go there. There’s fire, and you go in it!”

“Why have I never heard of this before? Or even thought about it?”

“You have to read the Bible to find out about hell. Jesus talked about it a lot. And it’s in Revelations. Death, hell, and the lake of fire.”

“Man. Ignorance was bliss. But now I think I’m really scared.”

“Well, that’s where Jesus comes in! He can save you from going there! There are of course some benefits here and now, but the real boon is not ending up where everyone else is going; it’s salvation from hell.”

I wonder if Christians ever stop and think about their message: we alert people of a scary place, tell people that they’re going there whether they know it or not, and then offer them the solution in the form of Jesus.

Whether you're the kind of person who roars it from a soapbox, or whispers it like an embarrassing secret, or mocks the very notion of it, let's all be honest. This doctrine of hell - that the baddies will be tortured forever without end because of what they didn't know or didn't accept - is a real problem. On all levels: logically, emotionally, ethically. Legitimately.

But what if all the evidence showed hell to be nothing more than us Christians' own convenient fiction?

I don't know about you, but I played so many video games and watched so many movies since I was a kid where the storyline revolved around an evil madman unleashing an epidemic on the general population, but the madman’s ultimate intent was to profit from his exclusive possession of the antidote, which he would distribute as his terms were met. “You want this to stop? Yes, I created this diabolical mess, but I also have the cure. Now listen to me….”

Those games and movies always end with the madman taken down. Intrinsically, we know that what he’s doing is just wrong. He can’t stay.

It’s time for us to take out the eschatological madman. He can't stay.

Either that God is mad and he can't stay, or that message is mad and it can't stay.

I eventually realized that the madman was me. Guy Christian. That was my madman doctrine, my madman message; unleash the fear, profit from the cure. Hell, Jesus, church.

And it has nothing to do with God.

If you don’t go to church or consider yourself a “Christian”, you’re likely thinking, “The hell thing is bull. Am I really supposed to believe I’ll burn forever someplace if I don’t embrace the right god?” It would never naturally occur to someone to believe in an eternal post-mortal torture chamber.

We Christians have to get it from a text. From some verses in the book of Revelations. From some things that we think Jesus said. From a four-hundred-year-old Anglican translation. From a tradition we don't even think about. From a clergy that discourages questions.

I know it may be a tough pill to swallow, but here it is: the Christians are wrong. Hell is not a place, and it doesn’t matter who you are, what you believe, or what you’ve done – you’re not going there after you die. How can you be so sure? Because “the Bible tells me so.”

Let’s take out the madman.

It’ll be a momentous task. After all, the doctrine of hell is buttressed by three false assumptions: 1) the book of Revelations talks about a place called hell; 2) the human soul is immortal; 3) Jesus preached about a place called hell.

Actually, no, no, and no.

Are you ready?

Blackberry Jesus

A while ago I received an interesting invitation, poking from my mailbox, fluttering in the afternoon wind.

It was from our neighbours. They’ve recently moved in, and want to get to know us better. They want to get to know everyone on the block better, as I could see from the little white pamphlets poking out of every mailbox on the street, fluttering in the afternoon wind.

The heading: “How can we help you?” It begins, beneath the smiling, professionally-photographed portrait of the well-groomed couple, “Hi there! We’re new in the area… we’re writing because we care about our community and want to offer our help of needed.”

“If there’s a need in your life or your family that you would like us to pray for we’re here to do that.”

“If you would like to learn how the Bible applies to your life, we’d love to take you through a Bible study.”

After church info and contact information: “If you’d like to get in touch with us for any of these things, anything else you need a hand with, or just to have someone to talk to, you can reach us.”

I called. I wanted a Bible study. A few hours of conversation together revealed that my Trinitarian view of God was false and that by not performing and adhering to certain extra-Biblical physical standards, I had no hope of salvation.

Only then did I think of returning to the pamphlet I’d received. Finding it tucked away on a bookshelf, I reread it with a special focus on the words.

“…We help you….” “…A need in your life….” “…You would like to learn….” “…You need a hand….” “…You can reach us….”

A few weeks ago I read an article about a Toronto hospital that is refusing to allow an Australian would-be organ donor to give up his kidney for a patient under their care. He flew into the city, passed all the psychological tests with the patient and was cleared for the procedure before the surgery was inexplicably cancelled. Suddenly, all subsequent efforts to proceed by both the patient and the donor were stonewalled.

The man is a member of the Jesus Christians, also coming to be known rather negatively as the “kidney cult”. About half of the thirty members, mostly Australian nationals, have undergone surgery to give up one of their kidneys to a patient in need.

Said the would-be donor: "The Jesus Christians believe that what Jesus said, he meant.”
“I decided to do it [donate a kidney] because I like positive things that can be done to help people. There are 6 billion people on the planet and helping one, I think it's just human nature."

But why did he come all the way to Canada, spending thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours working his way through the system?

The answer is simple: Australian law requires any living organ donor to have had a significant relationship – through blood or long-term friendship - with the recipient of the organ.
Why did the Canadian medical system refuse him? They couldn’t explain it; after all, he had passed all the psychological tests, but they felt it odd that he would circumvent his own country’s laws in order to perform such a hugely sacrificial act for someone with whom he had no relationship and with whom he had no intention of pursuing a relationship.

Isn’t that just like me, I think.

I would likely pass all the tests. I can recite verses, log in some prayer time, expound upon some theological and ethical opinions, recount some recent sermons I’ve heard. I want to get projects off the ground – it’s in my nature – and I want to really do things for the kingdom. I want to help others and be changed in the process.

But then someone calls me up, crying. But “Um, it’s late, and I like to be in bed by 10:30, so… can this wait? I’m sure it’ll blow over.”

Then one of my students in class tells me they have to move this Saturday, and they don’t have enough people to help them. But “Man, that sucks. Moving is no fun, eh? I'm sure one of your classmates will help you. Open your books to page….”

Someone on the street asks me for change. But “Aw, I just spent my last bit. I have no change on me right now.”

As though my job and my bedtime are more important than a hurting image-bearer of God.

As though professionalism and hierarchy trump opportunities for community.

As though the bills I didn’t tell this guy about can’t be broken to buy him a drink or a bite.

I’m realizing that I have to change my presuppositions about “helping people”. There’s a luxury and a self-righteousness that comes from “helping people” on my own terms. But when help becomes interruption, I comfortably seize the power I have over my own life to excuse myself.

But like the Toronto hospital, and like all the people who never called the well-intentioned couple down the street, people can see through self-serving serving – clean, express, drive-thru helping hands.

What if I started seeing myself as bound to people in need - those people all around me who I know need help?

When I read the Gospels I observe how Jesus walked all over the place with the next town in his head – he always had a destination and a route picked out. But the greatest stories we have in the accounts of his life are the ones where he is interrupted along the way. The bleeder-woman who touched his clothes. The blind guy who screamed out his name when he was on his way to somewhere else. The centurion who tracked him down on the road asking that his servant be healed. Zacchaeus. Nicodemus. These were not arranged meetings. These were all chance encounters - interruptions - that were not showing in Jesus’ Blackberry.

“Well, actually I’m headed to the next town and I want to get there before dark and all my disciples here are pretty tired, it’s been a helluva day….”

No. Jesus stopped. He bound himself to them. He conversed. He asked the hard questions. He sparked interest. He shared the pain. He changed his world. There was no “Come and I’ll educate you.” “I’ll pray for you.” “Are you interested in a Home Talmud Study?” “Poof! Whatever you want, just don’t bother me.” “It’s been a long day.” “Just attend Temple more regularly and it’ll sort itself out”. "Please drive thru to the first window."

He was more of a “What’s-weighing-you-down-most-right-now”, “Let’s-grab-something- to-eat”, “I’ll-see-you-at-the-party-tonight”, “Well-what-do-you-say-about-it” kind of guy.

Making money to pay for the rent and pay for my bike insurance and pay for my tuition makes me really tired. Getting up early is not my thing. The commute is long, and the teaching is draining. At the end of the day, I'm wiped.

And if I’m not careful and conscious of it, I will lose the vision that my purpose in making money for God is to use it for people who need it. And if the process of making money for God to use to help people makes me too tired to help people who could use the money I’m making to help people for God, then my life has really devolved into total absurdity, and I’ve neutralized myself into a Jesus-absent void.

I have to come to grips with the fact that I'm not really my own any more, and figure out the meaning behind the cliche. When I find myself in the middle of an interruption, wrestling power out of the hands of God in order to excuse myself and be on my way to the next thing in my itinerary is a massive disappointment to him, to myself, and to those around me.

Of course, the other option is to bank my paychecks, wave off the interruptors who make me aware of what they could really use right now, spend my money on getting better stuff, and restrict my donations to convenient and opportune times (such as when a shiny plate with rich green felt on the bottom gets passed down the row and into my hands by the person next to me).

But that’s not much of a life, is it?

Snake-Rod Jesus

“Caesar is Lord”. It was a common greeting among Roman citizens, especially soldiers and politicians, to the edges of an empire. It was also the slogan that had to be confessed by conquered, humbled people.

And the ultimate symbol of that lordship was the cross. Crosses lined the roads of cities and towns bearing the victims of Caesar’s justice – those who had resisted the crushing waves of Roman culture and failed.

To confess that Caesar was Lord was to confess to a new way of life, rendering to the Roman emperor whatever was due, be it taxes to his coffers or service to his legions or acceptance of new laws and building plans. It meant absolute surrender to his control; it meant conformity from one’s former way of life to total recognition of Roman supremacy.

Then Jesus comes along.

His followers start to say he’s “Lord”. His followers are identified because they live as ridiculously as he did: they love their enemies, make sure no one among them is wanting, take care of those less fortunate, and don’t fear persecution and death.

But after a couple of generations, some start to. They love people who are nasty and all, but decide that we really do need to redefine “enemies”, right? They make charity of poor people, but they don’t really have relationship with them. Those people, after all, pose a threat to their personal safety. And they start to mind their own business when it comes to personal finances – “you stay outta mine, I’ll stay outta yours”. They focus on protecting their own interests and hedging their bets against death.

The bigger the gap of history between Jesus’ days in Palestine and the present, the less his followers look and act like him.

I’m a full two thousand years removed from the God-man rabbi Jesus. He’s not my Lord.

He’s not my Lord because I don’t feel his dust on my feet. For that, I’d have to walk so close to him it choked me. He’s not Lord because if he showed up at my door tomorrow, I’d probably think, “Oh, crap, does this mean I gotta sell my motorcycle?” I’d have to go places I really didn’t want to go. He’s not Lord because I judge people by their appearance; I put people in categories and decide if they are worth my self-investment, or if they’re gonna burn me, or get the wrong impression, or.... He’s not Lord because I’ve made him a personal commodity – a personal Saviour.

Jesus very clearly drew an analogy between himself and that brass serpent Moses made in the desert. You know, the one Moses lifted up when people were getting all stung and poisonny when they happened to camp in the middle of a big snake pit. Moses told the people that all they had to do, when they recognized that they had been bitten, was to look at the snake rod and they would be totally restored to health.

Jesus said, “Yeah, I’m just like that. I will be lifted up like what Moses made so that whoever acknowledges my life and death will be rescued.” (John 3:14, my translation)

So, taking Jesus at his word, I do that, and I’m saved. I’m in. I’m a Christian. But that’s just where my problems begin. My Christianness is actually the root of my problem. Jesus is not my Lord, precisely because I’ve just become a Christian, just a Christian, and not a disciple.

Like those Israelites in the desert, I was initially rescued because of my faith and my obedience. Well, that was easy. So easy, in fact, that I’d like to recreate the experience whenever I can.
Israel was so impressed with their deliverance by the brass snake that they set up a shrine with the brass snake – it became a kind of idol to which they burned incense and made offerings. They even gave it – him – a name: Nehushtan. After all, it/he had saved them from a hell of fiery snakes. Keeping him around was smart.

I’ve done the same with Jesus. All my life. I recognize that he is my personal Nehushtan and I burn the incense of prayer to him and make offerings and I sacrifice stuff for him on occasion, remembering what he’s done for me in the past and hoping he’ll do more in the future. I’ve given him whatever name my theology fits him into. I’ve even assigned him a role: to save me and others from hell.

He’s actually not Lord because he’s become my own personal idol. An idol is anything or anyone that saves me from my idea of hell. No one is exactly sure how to define what the afterlife capital “h” Hell is. But we know Jesus saves us from that, whatever that is. But what we don’t realise is that we inadvertently use our Snake-Rod Jesus to save us from our hells on earth.

My hell is associating with poor, dirty people. My hell is having to put others first. My hell is not being able to enjoy the pleasures that others do. My hell is ruining my plans so someone else can get something. My hell is dealing with messed up lives. My hell is being used by people, or abused by people and not being able to fight back. My hell is dying.

So Snake-Rod Jesus wards off those things I don’t want to do. “Jesus doesn’t like _____ people, so I don’t have to associate with them.” I assign him to save me from dealing with them. “Jesus didn’t really address ______ specifically, so I can make my own judgment call on that one.” I designate him to approve of my ethics. “I give _____ to Jesus every month, so I don’t really have to help this person.” I delegate him to soothe my conscience.

It’s been a hard realization that I’ve missed the point; that God has rescued me through the work of Jesus, but now I worship Jesus because of that time he saved me and became so personal to me. I really liked what he did then; I want him to keep being likeable and saving me.

He’s not Lord. If he was, I’d live like him. I’d live like his apostles, because they lived like him. I’d live like his disciples, who lived like his apostles, who lived like him.

When did the chain get broken?

It happened when we made Jesus “personal”. When we made him our amulet. When we molded his divinely-inspired life into a shrine that we look at and remember and talk a lot about and sacrifice to. It happened when we melted him down.

Caesar’s cross of conquest culminated in the victorious death of Jesus. The chain of thousands of Roman crosses through centuries up till then had said, “Caesar is Lord”. Suddenly and subversively, along came a cross that showed the injustice of political and religious and economic systems and revealed that Jesus is the new Lord.

The biggest shortcoming of the Apostles’ and Nicene Creeds is that they desperately try to make Christ’s birth point to the cross point to his death point to something significant, without emphasizing that his lifestyle is what turned the tables of power. Without that emphasis, we’re left to figure out just what’s so significant about all those birthing and dying stories: personal salvation? eternal life? deliverance from sin? admittance into heaven?

The cross of Jesus points to his death. But the death of Jesus means nothing if it doesn’t point to the life he lived.

Unless Jesus’ death points to the life he lived to illustrate how human institutions snuffed out a perfect God/man – the “son of” or “quintessence of/ultimate image of” God and the “son of” or “quintessence of/ultimate image of” man – then we’re left trying to remember or recreate why Snake-Rod Jesus was so important anyway. We’re left with theology.

Our political, religious, and socioeconomic justice systems snuffed out God’s image back then; what else could they do with a guy who lived his life neither supportively approving nor violently opposing them? Jesus is still getting snuffed out by the same mentality today. Only this time it’s by Christians. If my political view contrasts with the ethics of Jesus, I put him away. If my religious tastes clash with the lifestyle of Jesus, I put him away. If my social preferences contrast with Jesus’ habits, I put him away. I focus on another aspect of his life. Birth. Death. Light another stick of incense.

Unfortunately, what you focus on determines what you miss.

“Jesus is Lord.” It was once the slogan confessed by conquered, humbled people. And the ultimate symbol of that lordship was the cross.

“Hezekiah got rid of the illegal places of worship, crushed the sacred stones, and cut down the poles dedicated to the goddess Asherah. He even crushed the bronze snake that Moses had made because up to that time the Israelites had been burning incense to it. They called it Nehushtan.” (2 Kings 18:4)

I have to restore the chain. My intended purpose is not that I use Jesus, but that Jesus use me, that he lord my life. And unless that terrible realisation molds me into being more like him – challenging myself and exposing the injustices imposed by the religious systems that shame outcasts, political systems that pander to selfishness, and economic systems that despise the poor – I’m looking to the cross without the life he lived, I’m a Christian without a Christ, a mirror without an image, and

Jesus is not Lord.

Candid

“Candidacy”. There’s such a safety in it. With the notion of “candidacy”, we can screen people. With “candidacy”, we can purify our collective. With “candidacy”, we can keep a clear vision. With “candidacy”, we can guard against interference.

Businesses prune a stack of résumés down to several prospective candidates. Thus begins the process of evaluating their qualities and skills. A successful candidate proves him or herself trustworthy. They are extended the trust they have shown themselves worthy of. They are hired.

Political parties tout their candidates as being qualified for the trust of the general public, and as being the most qualified personnel available, especially more qualified than those candidates of the opposing party. They are superior; according to the backing party, no one deserves to hold the contested office more than their candidate.

A candidate for a medical procedure has to have shown themselves fit to endure the rigours of the procedure. They must have demonstrated that they pose an acceptably small risk to the medical professionals who will administer the treatment, and perhaps also more importantly, to those who are bankrolling the experiment.

Students are candidates. Athletes are candidates. Borrowers are candidates. Their worthiness is intensely scrutinized by professors, scouts, loan officers.

“Candidacy” is about being professional enough. It’s about being persuasive enough. It’s about being smart enough, hitting the ball hard enough.

It’s about making the cut.

It’s about being eligible.

It’s about acceptance and rejection.

And now the Church has imported this notion. The Church has baptismal "candidates". The Church presses for "membership". Result: the church looks no different than the corporate machine or the political machine.

“Oh, but we don’t reject anyone!” insists The Church. “Everyone is welcome here, and our doors are open!”

This mantra has become a hollow and shallow balm thinly veiling the systematic religious process of rejecting some and accepting others.

Because “candidacy” makes acceptance contingent upon agreement.

This issue is so personal for me because I’m a recovering fundamentalist Pentecostal. “Membership” in my former church was no piece of paper or laminated card, it was the gift of speaking in tongues. If you hadn’t done it before, and if you didn’t do it in plain sight of others, your membership was in doubt. This led to spiritual displays of one-upmanship among those who did speak in tongues, and personal devastation for those who didn’t. “The gift is freely available to all!” the minister would call out. But everyone knew the names of those candidates who didn’t have the gift. No matter how much they loved God or loved each other, is was all contingent on this external sign.

In another personal example, an important woman in my life has carried baggage from an incident that occurred early in her life regarding "candidacy". When she was a preteen, she loved Jesus, went to church with her family every week, and attended Sunday School. The church had planned a baptism service in the coming months and was encouraging candidates to come forward and attend the weekly baptism classes. This young girl with a heart for Jesus went to the classes and expressed her desire to follow Jesus in baptism. After a few weeks, the elders deemed her unready. Unfit for the water. She had some work to do before she qualified. Her following teen years were rife with spiritual questions; she continually wondered how she could measure up, eventually doubting her candidacy to be worth much to God at all.

This has really gotten under my skin. But let’s face it: my skin is not the issue. The issue is whether or not this is a Biblical concept. So I turn to the Bible to see if it’s just me. Are there cases of “candidacy” or situations where candidacy would be appropriate in the Biblical accounts? If these situations do exist, was “candidacy” actually encouraged or practiced?

The disciples would be the most logical place to start. The most familiar accounts of Jesus’s choosing of his twelve are the ones where he approaches them as they fish and says “Follow me”. Then they follow him and, by the time of the crucifixion, turn out to be total misfits. Maybe by the end he was rethinking his brash selection method.

But Luke’s account makes us rethink the chronology of how he came about his decision. Apparently, if we presume the accounts by the seaside to be correct, it is only later that Jesus chose the fishermen to become some of his twelve talmidim – close followers. Luke 6:13 states that after a night of intense prayer Jesus called his disciples together in the morning. It is from this group that he chooses his twelve. He chooses the twelve from a larger group of disciples. After praying. And after the waterfront call.

And they end up being misfits.

The point is, after praying about it, Jesus’ only standard for his closest and most intimate followers was that they show up.

Now what happened to the other group from which the twelve were selected? Were the people in that group denied access? Where they any less “disciples”?

No.

Some would argue, “Of course they were denied access! Of course they were less qualified! Jesus must have known something about the twelve that set them apart from the others who were unfit for membership.”

Like what? Can you name one way that any rejected candidate among the larger group could have possibly failed Jesus more severely than his twelve ended up doing? His twelve talmidim questioned his vision, lacked faith, fought with each other, couldn’t follow his instructions, fell asleep on him, deserted him, and plotted his death. Jesus’s screening process was obviously not stringent enough to catch the potential troublemakers.

The book of Acts talks about a guy named Apollos who goes around preaching with a lot of zeal. In his letter to Corinth, Paul identifies Apollos as someone who people were so passionate about that they identified themselves as followers of Apollos specifically. Apollos obviously had some unique ideas. So unique, in fact, that Aquila and Priscilla invited him to their house and “explained to him the way of God more adequately” (Acts 18:26). But Apollos was not a candidate. His membership was not in jeopardy. He was a major evangelist in the early church whose teaching was refined in the community of other believers.

What about the Roman jailer in Acts? It is recorded that he and his entire household were baptized in the same hour that he first heard about Jesus Christ (Acts 16:33). And this was in the middle of the night! Did they really qualify? Should not their candidacy have been more thoroughly reviewed?

The letters of Paul address “brothers and sisters” and “holy ones” as the readers, but it becomes clear in their letters that these “holy ones” approve of sin, get drunk at communion, conduct disorderly services, judge each other’s external practices, etc. Paul patiently instructs them about the better way, and about their responsibility to each other as the body of Christ.

In another instance, on the Day of Pentecost, three thousand people were fully added – not partially added – to the body of believers in one day alone.

I can find no Biblical examples for “candidacy” or “membership” in the body of Christ.

And that’s where community is the crucial component. Without community, we need membership, and we need candidacy.

Candidacy is actually a substitute for relationship.

If I don’t know you, or have time to get to know you, a screening process will have to suffice. I look at your background. I look at your skill sets. I look at your accomplishments. I evaluate your usefulness. And I miss all the benefits of the process of taking your hand and making mistakes with you, sharing your doubts, and experiencing the pain of questioning God, denying him, seeing his hand in our mutual weakness.

The way we do modern church makes it impossible for me to have a relationship with you. After all, we both work forty hours a week, have a family, and need to carry out our responsibilities. Church is what we do on Sunday, and I have very little idea what you do all week. “Candidacy” will allow me to get a handle on you; “membership” is the way I can hold you accountable.

When I got married, I didn’t assent to a list of things Naomi and I agreed on. There was no criteria for her accepting me that day. She accepted me, not knowing what may happen in the future. She took a huge risk.

Like Christ’s relationship with his disciples, it’s in the very being, and in the very failing, and in the very feeble-mindedness that I am tempered. It’s in the following that I become a follower. It’s in the being a member of his body that I become a member of his body. It’s in the struggle to agree that I attain.

Like Naomi’s acceptance of me, it's in the stuff of life since our wedding day that we align ourselves with one another more and more each day. It's not in what transpired before it.

Acceptance must not be contingent upon agreement. Rather, agreement is the fruit of acceptance. Unity is the result of the process of loving God and loving each other, no matter how much we disagree on any point at any point.

When I get to a place where I accept my failing and my doubting, then I am ready to accept the same in others. And the failing and the doubting is the stuff of doing life together. It’s what disciples do. It’s the stuff on which community is built.

But candidacy and church membership make an official practice of me kidding myself.

These concepts presuppose that I have “arrived” to at least some degree. I, like most Christians, openly and rightly and readily confess – even bask in the fact – that “I don’t have everything figured out”. Then, in fantastic contradictory fashion, I who am in the position of considering candidates and collecting membership signatures, would turn around and require a new candidate for membership or baptism to have at least figured out x and/or y. Or if they have not fully figured it out, then at least they should assent to having tried.

Confession of sin, passage into baptism, receiving the Holy Spirit, and pursuing holiness through God- and neighbour-love is the ideal state for humanity. But I must never reject those who do not. And I must never favour those who do.

This is not about being against the safety of church politics. It's about being for the risk of relationships.

If I evaluate candidates and review memberships, I just mirror our world’s institutions. My church becomes another golf club with names over lockers, another airline rewarding exclusivity, another political popularity contest, another department store bringing savings to its own. Non-members are welcome, but not acceptable. And when the Church imports the criteria of corporate or political practice, it also imports their corresponding by-products: competition, value-judgment, and self-centeredness.

Jesus accepted me before I agreed with him. He accepts me even now, even as he and I disagree on things still unbeknown to me. I don’t have it all figured out, yet he considers me a member of his body.

Jesus has a pretty brutal track record of "candidate" selection and "membership" extension.

And it’s a good thing, because at what point will I have agreed with him enough, assented to enough creeds, or learned enough about him to ever be considered a worthy candidate?

Doing This and Really Living

A lawyer stood up and put Jesus to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus said to him, “What is written in the Law? How does it read to you?” And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbour as yourself.” And Jesus said to him, “You have answered correctly; do this and you will live.” Part A: love God. Part B: love your neighbour.

Last weekend’s city paper ran a feature article on a man who has radically defied convention – a man who for five months has reached new levels of loving his neighbour as himself. Of course, the paper didn’t bill it as such; this man is not feeding the orphans of Africa or building homes in earthquake-ravaged Pakistan.

He’s just a guy who lives in New York City with his wife and kid.

He has vowed that, for the span of one year, his life will be as close to “zero environmental impact” as possible. In some paces of the world, the measures he and his family have taken wouldn’t seem so drastic. But in a place like New York, that means living exactly like his neighbours don’t. And people are starting to notice.

For the past five months and the following seven, he has sworn off eating any produce that has not been grown within a two hundred and fifty mile radius of his home. This is in the direct and best interests of his community, he argues. If it’s a good harvest year, he eats well with the local farmer; if this year’s yields are low, he does without, side by side with the local agricultural takings.

He drinks no coffee. For one, it’s not locally produced. But this has yielded another side benefit: he has come to realize to what extent caffeine had ravaged his nervous system all these years. Formerly at ten cups a day, he had lost control of the ability to be in a state of motionlessness, let alone sleep soundly. Now he has recaptured such luxuries as peace and serenity. And people are starting to notice.

He eats nothing “that has a face or wiggles”. This due to the fact that most of the poorest countries of the world could be easily fed with just the grain that developed countries feed their agricultural livestock alone, if we could perchance wean ourselves off of our love for animal fat.

He uses no toilet paper. Most consumers, he argues, are totally unaware of the forest-management policies of such paper-producing corporations. In a market where the majority of paper corporations clear-cut the earth’s forests and wipe out swaths of natural habitat, it is most likely that a consumer ignorantly buys from a perpetrator such as this. He has reverted to bowls of water and towels.

He composts every scrap of food that he and his family don’t ingest, as well as their own feces. With landfill sites bursting at the seams and poisoning human water and food supplies, house-by-house composting eases the impact.

He rides a bicycle and takes only the stairs in any given New York skyscraper, regardless of his destined floor. He has lost weight and feels more fit. And people are starting to notice.

He has cut off running water – the average person uses about 750 liters per day. He has also requested that his house be removed from the electrical grid – wasted power hurls tonnes of greenhouse gases skyward.

When asked why he is doing this, he responds that it’s about doing everything he can to experience life at the micro level, about feeling more connected with his immediate community – with the farmers, commuters, greenspaces, his family. Technology tends to wall us off from everyone, and in this small way he feels more alive than he ever has before.

As the article unfolded I began to realize that this man is fulfilling Part B of Christ’s commandment to a tee. If everyone took stock of their lives to this extent, many of the world’s ills would begin to lift. Wealth would be more evenly distributed. Resources would be better managed. Health problems would be alleviated. Neighbours would be loved as ourselves.

When asked how his lifestyle affects his friends and friendships, he admits that he never pushes these views on people close to him. If a group is getting together to enjoy latte and risotto at a local non-fair-trade coffee franchise, he goes along. “If I railed on people I care about, that would actually defeat the purpose of what I’m trying to accomplish.” Wow. Who knew that attitude could possibly be effective? But people are starting to notice. His story is being written up in all the national papers, even.

I thought doing good was about me being good. I thought it was about my self-righteousness. I thought we were supposed to affirm our position by always avoiding and disdaining places that didn’t meet our standards. And above all, I was sure that we had to hammer it home to whomever we could, whether they were listening or not. As loudly and as clearly as possible. “No friend of mine does and /or thinks that.”

But there is a dark side to his obsession. He confesses that one of the most powerful motivations of it all is guilt. Guilt about nature being ravaged. Guilt about North American affluence. Guilt about waste and lethargy. He feels guilty, so this is how he makes a dent. For a while.

And that’s when I got it. For the first time I really understood it, and I suppose it took my seeing it in black and white, outside of a religious setting: without Part A of the commandment, Part B torments the self. It’s just a life sentence.

This man is doing great things, amazing things, and he is committing just one year to this lifestyle. Doubtless he will emerge a great person on the other end. He will be more knowledgeable, more sensitive. But after a year, the extremism is over.

This makes me think about churches, and about Christians. The failure rate of churches is staggering. Attendance is at an all-time low. Many new Christians pack it in within one year of conversion. Many lisensed ministers pack it in within one year of graduation. Many of those who do stay and do attend become judgmental and bitter shadows of their former selves. Where is the staying power?

It’s not there. It's not there because loving your neighbour as yourself, this extremism – turning the other cheek and loving your enemies and praying for your abusers and giving your coat to your robber and feeding the poor – is self-tormenting after a while.

To combat the waning, it has to be legalized. Loving like Part B doesn’t come naturally. And it’s just plain no fun. Being a Christian for one year, being a minister for one year, this is do-able, but for life? How can you keep up that kind of lifestyle? It would be like having no elevators or toilet paper or Starbuck's for the rest of your life!

So we write down all the things that we should and shouldn’t do. A list is a great standard.

Then we ramp up a heavy dose of weekly Sunday guilt. Guilt is a great motivator.

And we form a community to hold each other accountable to our standard through mutual motivation. Community is a great measuring stick.

So if someone comes along talking about grace, those of us with our lists and our guilt and our community start to freak out. Grace threatens our list. Grace threatens our guilt. Grace threatens our community. It weakens the importance of these things, and then our standard and our motivations and our measuring sticks crumble.

But that’s exactly what Part A is designed to do. Loving God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength is God’s way of cutting us down at the knees. If all I can do is love Jesus like that, then what’s the point of my list? If I recognize that I’m as fallen as everybody else on the planet, where’s the place for my guilt? If all there is is grace, then all I can do is love.

“Ah! Sounds like you’re an advocate for the social gospel!” says another Christian. “That’s why we especially emphasize Part A over Part B!”

We know what “especially emphasizing Part A” looks like. When Part B is not legalized, it’s ignored. Many of us grew up in that kind of church. It looks no different than the other group; it’s just a different list. It’s another shot at what makes God happy, but at the expense of others. “I will keep myself pure by imposing restrictions on myself. I will refrain from activities with people who don’t buy into the list. I will tell people that they need to conform to the list as the standard for loving God. This list will help us love God with all our everything without the messiness of our neighbours getting in the way.”

But that’s exactly what Part B is designed to do. We get messy, get dirty, get overwhelmed with the lives of others in our loving God with all our everything. Only then can we get it: I am not a shred better and not a shred more deserving and not a shred more righteous than anyone else. And this isn’t even discouraging!

Without Part B of the commandment, Part A torments those around me.

A) Loving my God and B) loving my neighbour is the only possible tandem for torment-free transformation. Jesus said it: do this, and you’ll really live.

It’s about experiencing life at the micro level, about feeling more connected with my immediate community – with the farmers, commuters, greenspaces, my family, my Jesus. In this small way I feel more alive than I ever have before. And people are starting to notice.

The standard I thought I needed to do good by – rules – is replaced by God’s hopelessly impartial love for you and me both. The motivation I thought was giving me my staying power – guilt – is replaced by being convinced that Jesus just really likes me as much as he loves me.

And he really likes you, too.

And he wants both of us to start really living.