Category Archives: Holy Days

Resurrection and New Creation

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“The new creation is not a different creation. It is the new creation of this deranged world. Eternal life is not a different life. It is the resurrection of this life into the life of God. . . . So the kingdom of God means that this world will be different and will be born anew out of violence and injustice to justice, righteousness and peace.”[i]                                                                                Jürgen Moltmann

After months of wind, rain, and snow, Easter Sunday was a glorious spring day, with greenery and flowers springing up all around. This Lenten blog series “Creation, Cross, and the Powers,” culminates today with me addressing the challenging question: How is the resurrection of Jesus relevant today, as we witness the deadly impacts of the domination system on our human family and the community of life? To answer this, I point to the following passage:

“So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ, and has given us the ministry of reconciliation” (2 Cor 5:17–18). The passage makes clear that the scope of reconciliation in “[the risen] Christ” extends beyond God and the individual to all creation.

The concept of new creation has been used to illustrate a hopeful vision of renewal that may motivate people to take seriously our call to care for the earth. One way that Christians have interpreted this concept is to relate it to the afterlife, as an assurance that no matter how bad things get here on earth, no matter how many ecosystems are destroyed or how many species go extinct, God will ultimately reconstitute creation in a renewed and even better way. But such ideas bring little comfort to those of us who love life here on earth as we witness the escalating speed and efficiency of the institutional engines of death that are destroying it.

Of course, the promise of resurrection and creation’s renewal at the end of time offers us freedom from the fear of death and fosters courage to face life’s challenges. But the biblical concept of new creation does not just symbolize hope that at the end of the world, God will reconstitute it in a new form. As Moltmann said, it symbolizes hope “that this world will be different.”

It is also an invitation to live in light of the resurrection now. Living in the Spirit of the risen Christ enables us to recognize the glory of God in creation, to live in reconciled relationships, to comfort those who suffer, to stand in solidarity against oppressive powers, to allow the love that we have received to flow through us, to acknowledge that all creation exists within the circle of God’s care, and to take actions that embody hope for the future and are proportional to the challenges we face—in short: to live into the reality of the new creation.

As extinctions become more numerous, climate change accelerates, and the powers assert themselves in ever more ecologically destructive ways, the biblical concept of new creation illustrates a spiritual reality that can be experienced and lived into. As followers of Jesus, we are already part of the new creation here and now, as is made clear in the text above. We are already part of a new creation because we are in Christ.

As reconciled people who are empowered as participants in God’s saving work in our time, we are called to reach out with the message of reconciliation not only for individuals but for creation as well. This path is costly. Carrying the message of reconciliation must include challenging dehumanizing institutional idols that are undoing creation, and working for systemic change in ways that enable people to flourish. In this process, we are given a new orientation toward life and courage to rise even when faced with seemingly insurmountable odds.

God rejoices with us when we rejoice, weeps with us when we weep, showers both the just and unjust with all the blessings of creation and calls us to embody love in this world. Jesus did just that. Those of us who follow him are called to do so fully and completely, renouncing fear and paralysis, living in the power of the Spirit of the risen Christ, rising in courage, and heading straight into the heart of the struggle for a transformed world.

 

Parts of this post were excepted from “Creation Crucified: The Passion of the Earth,” the fourth chapter of The Cross in the Midst of Creation, Sharon Delgado (Fortress Press, 2022).

This is the tenth post in a Lenten Series, “Creation, Cross, and The Powers.” 

  1. Creation, Cross, and The Powers. 
  2. Extraordinary Temptations
  3. The Spirituality of an Epoch
  4. Creation: Moving from Awe to Lament to Resistance
  5. Banking on Our Future as Demythologized Exorcism
  6. Don’t Look Up
  7. Care Enough to Weep
  8. The Death of Jesus in Context
  9. Resurrection and New Creation

Follow Sharon’s blog post by signing up at the “Follow” link to the right. Share with the Social Media buttons below. See also a previous Lenten series: A Lenten Call to Resist. Check out Sharon’s books.  Contact Sharon to request a complimentary digital chapter of one of her books, to request a presentation, or to order discounted bulk copies of her books. 

 

[i] Jürgen Moltmann, Jesus Christ for Today’s World (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1994), 22–23

 

 

The Death of Jesus in Context

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As we move through the story of Jesus’s death and on to resurrection, we return to the primary themes of this Lenten blog series on “Creation, Cross, and the Powers.”

This story is often told as if it all took place removed from the context of both creation and the powers. It is treated not as a story that we can relate to in terms of what is going on in the world today, but as a required dogma to keep us from being consigned to hell.  Jesus’s suffering and death is portrayed as if it was simply a transaction between God and humanity, a payment that God made to save sinners from eternal damnation. These transactional views turn Jesus into a passive and compliant victim and ignore his human agency and choice. His teachings and actions don’t enter this equation because what counts is his death.  They focus on death, not resurrection—not on his vindication by God despite the powers, or on his risen and ongoing presence among us.

But in the Gospels, this story is not told in the abstract, but in the context of both creation and the powers. Notice that creation is the context of both Jesus’s prayer and arrest in the Garden of Gethsemane and of his resurrection encounter with Mary in the garden on Easter morning.  And the story of his final confrontation with the authorities leading up to his arrest, trial, and crucifixion is one of the most political stories in the Bible (along with the Exodus story).

In these last days of Holy Week, we are invited to immerse ourselves in this story and to recognize with mind and heart what Jesus and his followers experienced during this final confrontation with the governing authorities of occupied Jerusalem. After his “triumphal entry into Jerusalem,” they went directly to the Temple. Jesus’s action of overturning the tables of the moneychangers there directly threatened the economic status quo (tribute and taxes to Rome/temple taxes to keep the system going). According to the Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke), that was the last straw.

When Jesus and his followers “occupied” the Temple, the elite religious leaders couldn’t arrest him because “they feared the people” (Luke 20:19, 22:2). They couldn’t disperse the people who had gathered to hear Jesus because “the whole crowd was spellbound by his teaching” (Mark 11:18). “People power” at work.

For this reason, the religious authorities had to arrest Jesus by stealth in the Garden of Gethsemane. Their problem was that the Jewish nation was under the jurisdiction of Rome—including the religious leaders, Jesus, and his followers. Only a representative of Rome could sentence Jesus to death.  That’s where Pilate came in.  Things moved on from there.

If this story is told out of context, it doesn’t make sense unless you consent to a particular dogma. But if you read it with an open mind, you can see that the words of Paul are true: “None of the rulers of this age understood [the wisdom that comes from God]. If they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory.” (1 Corinthians 2:6-8). God triumphs through Jesus despite the powers, bringing light out of darkness and light out of death.

(For a fuller portrayal of the story of the events that led to Jesus’s death, see this excerpt from Chapter 5, “Jesus and the Powers,” from The Cross in the Midst of Creation.

This is the eighth post in a Lenten Series, “Creation, Cross, and The Powers.” The other posts are as folows: 

  1. Creation, Cross, and The Powers. 
  2. Extraordinary Temptations
  3. The Spirituality of an Epoch
  4. Creation: Moving from Awe to Lament to Resistance
  5. Banking on Our Future as Demythologized Exorcism
  6. Don’t Look Up
  7. Care Enough to Weep
  8. The Death of Jesus in Context
  9. Resurrection and New Creation

 

Follow Sharon’s blog post by signing up at the “Follow” link to the right. Share with the Social Media buttons below. See also a previous Lenten series: A Lenten Call to Resist. Check out Sharon’s books.  Contact Sharon to request a complimentary digital chapter of one of her books, to request a presentation, or to order discounted bulk copies of her books. 

Care Enough to Weep

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Last weekend I was on a silent retreat, sharing prayer spaces and meals with a few church friends and a larger group of Buddhists.  On Saturday I walked the Stations of the Cross at the retreat center, knowing that the next day was Palm Sunday, the beginning of Holy Week. Sometimes when I walk that path, one or another of the statues portraying the events of Jesus’s last hours overwhelms me. This time it was the first statue, the one that portrays Pilate sitting in judgement, with a child pouring water from a pitcher over Pilate’s hands as he washes them, and into the bowl beneath. It struck me that this really was the decisive moment, the official decision that set the crucifixion into motion, with all the other participants (executioner, soldiers, and the like) carrying out their assigned roles–just doing their jobs.

Grief washed over me, along with the realization that this dynamic is at the root of the harm being done to creation today, as individuals relinquish their responsibility in the face of powers that seem out of human control. Looking at that stature brought home to me how Pilate’s action of washing his hands of Jesus’s fate is exactly the cause of the extremity of the global situation we face today. I wept.

Of course, the stage for Jesus’s trial and execution had been set long before. Jesus’s passion for the reign of God and his teachings and actions to bring it about had threatened the uneasy collaboration between the Jewish religious establishment and the Roman army that occupied Jerusalem.

I will return to the story of Jesus’ trial and execution in a later post in this series. For now, let’s consider the story of Palm Sunday. Surely Jesus riding into Jerusalem on a donkey’s colt and the people calling on him to save them and hailing him as king further antagonized the religious authorities. They saw him as a political threat to the established order of the violently enforced Pax Romana, the so-called “Roman Peace.” When the Pharisees demanded that Jesus order his followers to stop, he replied, “I tell you, if these were silent, the stones would shout out” (Luke 19:40).

The way Luke tells the story, as they came near to Jerusalem and saw it, he wept over it. Jesus wept! He could see what was coming. He said, “If you, even you, had only recognized on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. Indeed, the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up ramparts around you and surround you, and hem you in on every side. They will crush you to the ground, you and your children within you, and they will not leave one stone upon another because you did not recognize the time of your visitation from God” (Luke 19:41-44).

Jesus weeps because he can foresee the terrible things will befall the people of Jerusalem and their descendants. This destruction is not God’s will, but is the result of people not recognizing God’s presence among them or “the things that make for peace.”

Jesus weeps. As we look at creation’s dilemma today, which is also our dilemma since we are part of creation, we also have reason to weep. According to climate scientists, (in many ways the today’s prophets), we can see that the terrifying consequences of industrialized civilization are already upon us and are coming at ever greater degrees of magnitude for future generations. Who are our “enemies”? According to Ephesians 6:12, “our struggle is not against enemies of blood and flesh, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.”  In other words, against the powers and principalities.

Like the Pax Romana, Pax Americana will not bring us “the things that make for peace,” for it is also ultimately enforced through violence, including racial, gender, and economic violence. Today’s corporate-dominated global capitalist system is also enforced by multiple modes of violence. It is incapable of protecting us from the certain ecological consequences of our current way of life, which are essentially locked in by our interlocking network  of global institutions, unless we discern “the things that make for peace” and perceive where God is at work in our world. Only then will we be able to discern what steps we might take to avert disaster.

What can we do? When William Stringfellow was asked this question, he said, “If you want to do something, the most practical thing I can tell you is: weep.  First of all, care enough to weep.”[i]

Like Jesus, we can weep.

This is the seventh post in a Lenten Series, “Creation, Cross, and The Powers.” The other posts are as follows: 

  1. Creation, Cross, and The Powers. 
  2. Extraordinary Temptations
  3. The Spirituality of an Epoch
  4. Creation: Moving from Awe to Lament to Resistance
  5. Banking on Our Future as Demythologized Exorcism
  6. Don’t Look Up
  7. Care Enough to Weep
  8. The Death of Jesus in Context
  9. Resurrection and New Creation

Follow Sharon’s blog post by signing up at the “Follow” link to the right. Share with the Social Media buttons below. See also a previous Lenten series: A Lenten Call to Resist. Check out Sharon’s books.  Contact Sharon to request a complimentary digital chapter of one of her books, to request a presentation, or to order discounted bulk copies of her books. 

 

 

[i] William Stringfellow: Essential Writings, Bill Wylie-Kellerman, editor (Fortress Press, 2013)),  page 180.

Creation: Moving from Awe to Lament to Resistance

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Being-at-one is not individualist self-realization but moves beyond that to change death-oriented reality. Being-at-one shares itself and realizes itself in the ways of resistance.             Dorothee Soelle

Lent is always a fruitful time for me, a time to reset my focus and reestablish practices that nourish my soul. Prayer is at the top of my priorities, not just during Lent but always. For me, it is the key to being able to face today’s painful realities without succumbing to anxiety, denial, avoidance, cultural accommodation, and despair.

This morning I awoke to another four inches of snow that had fallen on top of the previous layers. I spent time in prayer while looking out on the scene of birds and squirrels happily eating the seed and bread crumbs I had just scattered. My prayer turned from awe to lament to gratitude to intercession to “resting in the stillness and submerging myself in it” (Dom Helder Camara). But even as the beauty and presence of God in creation consoles me, I am aware of the groans of creation in our time.

The degradation of the natural world and the associated suffering of human beings, especially those who are most vulnerable, are painful topics. It might seem easier to avoid them. Facing the reality of our time is a mixed blessing, but denial takes away our ability to grow spiritually through this terrifying time.

The season of Lent an opportunity to accompany Jesus on his journey to the cross, to recall the story of his life and passion for the reign of God, to witness the religious and political authorities conspire against him, to “stay awake” with him as he prays in the Garden of Gethsemane, and to stand with him in his suffering. Facing the suffering of Jesus enables us to face our own suffering, the suffering of our human family, and the suffering of creation.

The late German feminist theologian Dorothee Solle pointed out that so much damage has been done to the earth that our ability to celebrate God through creation with our “original amazement” is hindered: “Mystical spirituality of creation will very likely move deeper and deeper into the dark night of being delivered into the hands of the principalities and powers that dominate us. For it is not only the poor man from Nazareth who is tortured together with his brothers and sisters on the cross, it is also our mother earth herself.”[1]

Solle, one of my favorite theologians, then speaks of letting go of bondage to today’s “consumer culture and plundering” and links “letting go” to “resistance.” She explains that for her, resistance means compassion and justice, living in God, and changing the world. She says, “The concept of resistance that meets us in many places of mystical tradition is broad and diverse. It begins with not being at home in this world of business and violence.”[2]

Scripture presents this as a struggle:

“Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his power;  put on the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil, for our struggle is not against blood and flesh but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. Therefore take up the whole armor of God, so that you may be able to withstand on the evil day and, having prevailed against everything, to stand firm. Stand, therefore, and belt your waist with truth and put on the breastplate of righteousness and lace up your sandals in preparation for the gospel of peace. With all of these, take the shield of faith, with which you will be able to quench all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.  Pray in the Spirit at all times in every prayer and supplication” (Eph 6: 10-18).

It may be easy to imagine “the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places” as demons or spirits just floating around in the air. But my concern is how these forces are embodied in actual institutions and systems that dominate the world, how they manifested in Jesus’s time, and how they manifest today. In contemporary language: the Powers that Be.

Engaging the institutional powers involves a struggle not simply against their harmful outward manifestations but also against our tendency to internalize their values and be swallowed up in their milieu. Our struggle against “the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places” is not simply external, for all of us participate to some degree in the powers that are manifest in the outer world, and our inner landscape is a microcosm that encompasses the whole.

We are called to exercise our freedom in Christ as we relate to the powers, calling them back to their rightful role as servants, rather than as dominators, of life. In this way, by living in creative resistance to anything that engenders futility and oppression, grounded in God’s love, and renewed and motivated by the Spirit’s call, we participate in God’s triumph over the powers and principalities in our time.

This post includes an excerpt from Sharon’s book, The Cross in the Midst of Creation: Following Jesus, Engaging the Powers, Transforming the World (Fortress Press, 2022).

This is the fourth post in a Lenten Series, “Creation, Cross, and The Powers.” The other posts in the series are as follows: 

  1. Creation, Cross, and The Powers. 
  2. Extraordinary TemptationsThe Spirituality of an Epoch
  3. The Spirituality of an Epoch
  4. Creation: Moving from Awe to Lament to Resistance
  5. Banking on Our Future as Demythologized Exorcism
  6. Don’t Look Up
  7. Care Enough to Weep
  8. The Death of Jesus in Context
  9. Resurrection and New Creation

Follow Sharon’s blog post by signing up at the “Follow” link to the right. Share with the Social Media buttons below. See also a previous Lenten series: A Lenten Call to Resist. Check out Sharon’s books.  Contact Sharon to request a complimentary digital chapter of one of her books, to request a presentation, or to order discounted bulk copies of her books. 

[1] . Dorothee Soelle, The Silent Cry, page 92.

[2] . Soelle, 197.

Extraordinary Temptations

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Matthew 4:1-11, Luke 4: 1-13, Mark 1:9-15

The suggested Bible readings for the first Sunday in Lent are always about Jesus encountering the devil in the wilderness. This is the perfect theme for this second post of my Lenten series, “Creation, Cross, and The Powers.”

Jesus has just been baptized. He has received an extraordinary experience of the Holy Spirit and a profound blessing and calling by God. Now Jesus has retreated into the wilderness to fast and pray. Creation is the context in which the devil appears to Jesus, who is faced with temptations. These are not just what we might consider “ordinary” temptations, but vocational temptations that force Jesus (or anyone who follows him) to deeply consider what it means to be a beloved child of God.

What is ultimately life-giving, and how will I share that with others? What does it mean to put my whole trust in God without recklessly taking God for granted? Is my loyalty to God strong enough to withstand the allurements offered by “all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor” (Matthew 4:8)? According to Luke, the devil put this last temptation to Jesus very aggressively. After showing him “all the kingdoms of the world in a moment in time,” he said, “To you I will give their glory and all this authority: for it has been given over to me, and I give it to anyone I please” (Luke 4:6).

After Jesus met these challenges with scripture, he began his public ministry. His initial struggle with the devil in the wilderness informed his future choices and set the stage for his crucifixion. The way he lived out his calling, fully committed to the reign of God, is what got him into trouble with the governing authorities of his day.

As followers of Jesus, these very questions, these temptations, also confront us. Creation is a good context for soul searching for us, too. It is harder now for us to find wilderness or to take off for forty days at a stretch. But perhaps we can carve out some time to at least step outside, to take a walk, to visit a park, to look up through a window at the moon and stars, or even to  enter imaginatively into creation in prayer. This enables us to get grounded in who we are as created beings. For yes, we are beloved children of God, but we are also part of God’s (beloved) interconnected community of life.  According to Mark, Jesus was not just alone in the wilderness, but “with the wild beasts.”

Those of us who live privileged lives in this technological society, many of us alienated from creation, are beset by “ordinary” temptations daily. Choices seem endless, but with the vast array of “tempting” choices, a sense of freedom can be elusive. Instead, many of us feel trapped. The larger vocations questions also confront us: Who are we as children of God (and children of the earth)? Where do we put our loyalty and trust, in the benefits offered to us by cultural accommodation to the institutional powers that dominate the world today (the kingdoms of the world and their splendor), or in God?  These questions are worth reflecting on during this season of Lent.

For other blog posts by Sharon on the story of Jesus in the Wilderness, see Jesus, Temptation, and Worldly Power and Resisting Cultural Possession.

This is the second post in a Lenten Series, “Creation, Cross, and The Powers.” The other posts in the series are as follows: 

1. Creation, Cross, and The Powers. 

2. Extraordinary Temptations

3. The Spirituality of an Epoch  

4.  Creation: Moving from Awe to Lament to Resistance

5. Banking on Our Future as Demythologized Exorcism

6. Don’t Look Up

7. Care Enough to Weep

8. The Death of Jesus in Context

9. Resurrection and New Creation

Follow Sharon’s blog post by signing up at the “Follow” link to the right. Share with the Social Media buttons below. Read other blog posts related to climate change here. Check out Sharon’s books.  Contact Sharon to request a complimentary digital chapter of one of her books, to request a presentation, or to order discounted bulk copies of her books.