St. Luke’s / Prescott, AZ
The Rev. Mark Moline
Sunday March 15th, 2009
Title: “The Thinking Christian”
Today’s second reading certainly presents us with a strange and somewhat disturbing, seemingly anti-intellectual message for those of us who like to think; that is to think of the Episcopal Church as the thinking person’s church. Those of us like me who like to place reasoned thinking alongside scripture as a sound approach to our relationship with God. Those of us who preach: “God gave us our minds with the expectation that we will use them?” So what do we make of this awkward passage? How are we to respond to Paul’s quote from Isaiah, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise?” Paul then challenges, “Has not God made foolish the wisdom of this world.” How should thinking people react to this?
One option would be to adopt a literal response, which would seem to suggest that we should all strive for worldly foolishness. The fallacy of the faulty dilemma; “if wisdom is indeed undesirable then surely foolishness is desirable. Therefore – let’s all be foolish.” A literal response to the Word calls for us to suspend thinking and blindly follow the preacher. Now that is foolish. Paul was not foolish. Paul was a thinker, and a scribe and a debater – indeed Paul was everything that he seems to demean with his own words in this very passage. The message of the cross is foolishness to the world, but we don’t need foolishness – we need the cross. We don’t need the faulty logic of dicto simpliciter.
Another optional response for us might be to simply reject the works of Paul. Many in today’s church do just that. They write him and all his writings off as a lost cause. They don’t like some of the things Paul has written so they simply disallow everything he has written: Argumentum ad Hominem. Or the man had faults – therefore all that he wrote is faulty. They say, “Paul was just a product of his time and culture.” He was indeed – we all are to some extent. But I don’t think there is any greater arrogance than chronological snobbery. How dare we dismiss Paul’s time. Science does this all the time. Scientists scoff at the science of the early 1900s, as though they have arrived at the truth today, as though future generations of scientists will not in turn scoff at their science. Will today’s efforts to retard global warming actually trigger the ice age of the 22nd Century, or will those same efforts simply be too little – too late to avoid the global meltdown of the 22nd Century?
The truth of the matter is, today’s science can no more afford to ignore the science of the early 1900s, than today’s theologians can afford to ignore the dated theology of Paul. In both cases, there is much to profit from both the successes and failures of the past. In the words of today’s appointed psalm: “One day tells its tale to another, and one night imparts knowledge to another.”
Paul never claimed to be without his faults and failures. In his letter to Titus the missionary to Crete, Paul wrote that it was true that “Cretans are always liars, evil brutes and lazy gluttons.” Now, the question becomes, can a modern day believer from the Island of Crete still learn from Paul’s biased writing? In fact we can learn much about the pain of human bias and prejudice from Paul. We can learn that even those who believe in Christ are still susceptible to the deceit of racism, gender bias and other human prejudices. The fact that these weakness come from a “so-called good person” doesn’t lessen the pain perpetrated upon its victim. We can learn that those who love God may not always love all others, especially the culturally perceived unlovely.
The truth of this matter is that it is just these difficult passages that most invoke thinking, and even questioning God. Whoever was it who came up with the concept that we dare not question our heavenly Father? Someone who had no concept of being a child must have been the first to equate questioning with doubt. When my children were small and had great faith in me knowing everything, it was then they had incessant questions for me about everything. I was dad; they knew I knew the answers. It was only when they became teenagers and discovered they knew I knew nothing, only then did those incessant questions cease. Your sincere heartfelt questions are not tantamount to doubt. Honor God with your questions. Know that he knows. Be as a little child.
Can we think logically and open-mindedly about that with which we disagree? Can we remain open to new insights into our own weaknesses and strengths? I don’t know how we can summarily dismiss the teachings of St. Paul and simultaneously hang on to our Episcopal three-legged theology of scripture, tradition and reason. Surely a traditional reasoned reading of this scripture will reveal not a condemnation of human intellect, rather the capacity of that intellect to grasp the higher wisdom of God.
Is not Paul here demonstrating that through faith and belief the unwise can become wise, and that the wise are often foolish, especially in spiritual matters of faith? Who can deny that indeed many do find the crucifixion of Christ to be foolish? Whether it’s George Carlin or Bill Maher, there is undeniably big money to be had in the pop-culture humor of making your and my faith seem foolish.
Isn’t Paul’s central thesis here actually that the wisdom of the creator is superior to that of the created. Who among us will be so unthinking as to deny that thesis? Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Perhaps they are those who proclaim Christ crucified! To those who are being saved that wisdom is nothing less than the power of God. For in the crucifixion, God’s weakness is far stronger than human strength.
