What to say?

Where is your God?

A video worth playing a couple of times, on which to ponder:

Bish informs us it comes to us courtesy of UCCF Relay workers Millie (performer), Rael (poet) and Andy (director/cameraman).

[HT: Dan Steel]

Quote of the day: Not because of me

"Look, don't believe in Christ because I'm a marvelous person with wonderful experiences and morality. Look at Christ, because you and I both are so sinful and so prone to evil that we need a Saviour."

- Michael Horton, in an interview with Christianity Today which is well-worth reading.

Finding history on a disk in the desert

You find some historical documents on a disk in a desert cave.

Is it a stone disk with markings, or a compact disk of files?

Which would you be more likely to trust as a reliable source?
The stone disk may be verifiably more ancient. But the CD could contain old data, accurately copied & pasted many times onto new formats, losing none of the original. Would you penalise a community who used advanced technology, presuming that because they did so, they hadn't kept an accurate record of their history?

That seems to be the question behind assumptions on the reliability of the Old Testament with regard to ancient records and manuscripts. Read Peter Williams' short & helpful theologynetwork article.

To destroy the devil's work!

Mark Driscoll is excellent in this televised discussion / debate on 'Does Satan exist?' [HT Steve Camp, via Bish.] It's long, but very much worth hearing how Driscoll hones in on various key issues, has clearly taking time to understand the philosophy of those he's debating, and identify what's key to address. He's remarkably clear too, not using language his audience may not understand, and always clarifying truth where it could be confused by / with error. He also consistently points to Jesus, from his Word.

Quote of the day: dogmatism

"If it comes to human testimony, there is a choking cataract of human testimony in favour of the supernatural. If you reject it, you can only mean one of two things. You reject the peasant's story about the ghost either because the man is a peasant or because the story is a ghost story. That is, you either deny the main principle of democracy, or you affirm the main principle of materialism - the abstract impossibility of miracle. You have a perfect right to do so; but in that case you are the dogmatist. It is we Christians who accept all actual evidence - it is you rationalists who refuse actual evidence being constrained to do so by your creed."

- G K Chesterton, Authority and the Adventurer, in Orthodoxy.

Quote of the day: destroying humanity for the want of God

"I know a man who has such a passion for proving that he will have no personal existence after death that he falls back on the position that he has no personal existence now. He invokes Buddhism and says that all souls fade into each other; in order to prove that he cannot go to Heaven, he proves that he cannot go to Hartle-pool. I have known people who protested against religious education with arguments against any education, saying that the child's mind must grow freely or that the old must not teach the young. I have known people who showed that there could be no divine judgement, by showing that there can be no human judgement, even for practical purposes. ...

We do not admire, we hardly excuse, the fanatic who wrecks this world for love of the other. But what are we to say of the fanatic who wrecks this world out of hatred of the other? He sacrifices the very existence of humanity to the non-existence of God. He offers his victims not to the altar, but merely to assert the idleness of the altar and the emptiness of the throne. He is ready to ruin even that primary ethic by which all things live, for his strange and eternal vengeance upon someone who never lived at all.

"And yet the thing hangs in the heavens unhurt. Its opponents only succeed in destroying all that they themselves justly hold dear. ...

"The secularists have not wrecked divine things; but the secularists have wrecked secular things, if that is any comfort to them. The Titans did not scale Heaven; but they laid waste the world."

- G K Chesterton, The Romance of Orthodoxy, in Orthodoxy.

Out of the Silent Planet

One of my favourite novels is being read on Radio 7 at the moment. C.S.Lewis' Out of the Silent Planet is the second in his space trilogy, and contains a devastating and penetrating apologetic against the fall, and understanding of sin. I wonder if the BBC reading will capture that?

Late correction - Out of the Silent Planet is the first in the trilogy, with Perelandra being the second (entitled 'Voyage to Venus' in America). So I'll have to wait to see if they'll broadcast Perelandra too. In the meantime, if you haven't read the trilogy, do get hold of them.

Belief in an age of skepticism

Tim Keller in action addressing students in Berkeley, America, on responses to the religious problem, including Q&A:



[HT: Ant]

Should the madman rule?

Chris features a report on the opening debate from the Edinburgh festival, Hitchens' vs. Lennox on The New Europe Should Prefer the New Atheism. Looks like a good debate - I'll be looking out for the recording if it's produced. In Nietzsche's language, one could rephrase the debate: the madman should rule. Though I'd think for Nietzsche that if the New Europe actually consisted of his new men, the question wouldn't need to be asked.

Quote of the day: when you say, 'I see'

I implore you to remember the Irishman and his two stoves.* There are progressions in which the last step is... incommensurable with the other - and in which to go the whole way is to undo all the labour of your previous journey. To reduce [objective good and evil] to a mere natural product is a step of that kind. Up to that point, the kind of explanation which explains things away may give us something, though at a heavy cost. But you cannot go on 'explaining away' for ever: you will find that you have explained explanation itself away. You cannot go on 'seeing through' things for ever. The whole point of seeing through soemthing is to see something through it. It is good that the window should be transparent, because the street or garden beyond it is opaque. How if you saw through the garden too? It is no use trying to 'see through' first principles. If you see through everything, then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent world is an invisible world. To 'see through' all things is the same as not to see.

- C.S.Lewis, in The Abolition of Man

* I confess I've no idea to which doubly-bestoved Irishman he refers. Doubtless it's delightfully pertinent.

Christian Arrogance? 3

Aren't Christians arrogant to claim to know the truth?
[Lunchbar from Warwick CU - 3rd instalment]

Christians do claim to know the truth. But it’s not that we’re super spiritual and super intelligent and have it all worked out more than everyone else. No, as far as finding the truth goes, the Bible’s description is something like that we were like aspiring astronomers stubbornly sitting in a darkened room playing around with mud, while the teacher had set up telescopes outside. That’s how much we were super intelligent spiritual searchers. Christians don’t claim to know the truth because we were great, but because Jesus graciously stepped into the muddy dark room and blasted off the roof so we could see the stars, and then lifted our heads up so we’d bother, and enjoy. Jesus introduced us to God when we weren’t looking for it at all: he is the truth – he reveals God, he doesn’t just fit in with our search for him. Christians don't claim to know the truth because we were good, but because Jesus graciously stepped into our muddy darkness and took it on himself, so we could bear the light of God's presence without being destroyed. We know him and we want you to know him: not to know the truth as in to acknowledge that we’re right, but to know the truth as in to see that Jesus is true - we’re inviting you to see that and have the joy of knowing him.

But maybe you’re thinking, “I’m sorry, but so & so claims to be a Christian and is really arrogant when she talks about it!” Sadly, some of us do still struggle with pride and can come across as arrogant. There’s no question! And it's revolting. You might be mistaken of course – maybe your friend is a really confident person, or happy, or nervous how you’ll react, and it comes across as arrogance! But for those who really do seem arrogant, now you know we have no excuse. And here I’d speak as much to those of you who call yourselves Christians. Because we need reminded that knowing the truth (knowing Jesus) leaves us absolutely no place for arrogance. No place for boasting. No place for pride. We need reminded – so listen up as I say this to Christians – this is what you can say to an arrogant Christian friend. “You’re coming across as arrogant when you say that – but you’re supposed to believe this – it’s inconsistent.”

The Bible describes how we are all completely on a level – we might try to do our best by our conscience, or by some religious law, but we’re no better off than anyone ultimately: we’re none of us reflecting God’s glorious design for our lives, living loving each other completely and selflessly, and living in thanks to God for everything. It’s not that some of us are further up a ladder than others. No. Some of us have shaken our fist at God and yelled in his face, and some of us have just quietly & stubbornly ignored him and got on with what we wanted to do, but as any teacher will tell you, the kid who quietly but stubbornly ignores you and gets on with his own thing is just as much rebelling as the one who’s screaming at you. Some of us have said, “There isn’t any God!” and refused to give thanks to him, not even considering Jesus. And some have done the spiritual thing and said, “I think God’s like this…” and refused to acknowledge the true God who revealed himself in Jesus. Some of us have said, “To hell with everyone else: I’m doing it my way!” and some of us have said, “I try to be nice to other people like I want them to be nice to me”, but none of us is so selfless that we love others even like that – the annoying ones, the pathetic ones, the arrogant ones(!), even the ones in our own family. No, we’re none of us reflecting God’s glorious design for our lives, knowing him, loving each other completely and living in thanks to God. We’re none of us any better off ultimately. We may be on different rungs of the ladder of goodness, but compared with God’s magnificence, the ladder’s lying flat along the ground in the mud. We’re completely on a level when it comes to knowing God, to knowing the truth. We can’t do it and we not even very interested! There’s no place for arrogance.

But that’s where Jesus steps in. He not only claims to know the truth, and be able to tell us the truth; he is the truth. As I said, he blasts away the roof on our hovel and shows us the stars. He doesn’t reject God’s glorious plan and refuse to thank God; he lives reflecting God’s glory, as intended. He doesn't rebel against God: in Jesus, God takes our rebellion onto himself and does away with it, punishing it. He announces that despite all our level best being level awful and full of selfish pride at the best of times, we can know God through him. We can have full life, through him. Rather than automatically doing wrong, hurtful things – you know, you wake up the next morning and say, “Why did I say that?” – we can know the truth, and the truth will set us free.

Where does that leave arrogance? Or boasting? There’s absolutely no place for it! That’s exactly what Paul says in the NT actually, after describing what Jesus did for us: he concludes, “So where is boasting? It is excluded!” You haven’t cleverly found the way to know God – no matter how nice a person, we all were level in the dirt as far as knowing God went, and yet we all can know him & enjoy his glorious life through Jesus. So if the Christian on your corridor comes across as arrogant, you can remind them of that!


We all fail, and can forget and get proud, or appear arrogant. It's disgusting. Which just shows all the more that it isn’t through better intelligence or goodness that we can claim to know truth and share it with you. But we invite you to know Jesus. We invite you to not be arrogant yourself as to presume to dismiss him without reading the accounts of those who knew him best and did a load of careful research to share it with others. They invite you to see what the best explanation of the evidence is – not to boast in your achievement, but to know Jesus and have life through his achievement!

Christian Arrogance? 2

Aren't Christians arrogant to claim to know the truth?
[Lunchbar from Warwick CU - 2nd instalment]

To claim to know some truth we want to share: it’s not that we know everything. But we can know some things truly. We look at the evidence and match up the best explanation. That’s how we all live, isn’t it? We don’t any of us claim to know the whole truth about life, the universe, and everything (unless it’s 42) – but we know some things truly enough to operate, to live our lives. That’s not arrogance: that’s just reality. We know some truths of history, by examining source material. (Our historian friends will tell us it's complicated: but we do know some truths of history in the end.) We know some truths of biology, by examining the body. Actually, most of us know those things on the basis of others telling us – testimony (whether a friend, a textbook, a lecturer or because it was mentioned on CSI!).

So while we don’t know everything, we know some things truly: we know some truths, and can trust them enough to live by them – enough biology to know what to eat and what meds to take, enough history to know never to start a land war in Asia, enough maths to be amused at Birmingham Uni’s engineering dept, who designed a carpark, which when built, proved not to be able to bear the weight of cars on the 2nd level. [NB to Birmingham students - sorry: but we are all amused by it, aren't we?] It’s hardly arrogant to claim to know some truth – we all do it and live by it.

To claim to know truth about Jesus isn’t any different. It’s not that we’re saying “We made up a nice system we know isn’t true but we’re going to impose it on you because we think it’s best and then we’re in control.” Not a bit of it! Not a bit of it. We’re saying, Look: there was a man Jesus who lived 2000 years ago who showed such authority in teaching, in healing, in making storms stop at a word, in raising the dead: this was no ordinary man. People concluded that he revealed God. That was the best-fit explanation! He died and came back to life himself, and he claimed on that basis to have authority over everything. We’ve looked at the evidence and we’re sure enough to trust him and wait for him to rescue us when he comes back to judge – and that transforms our lives. Here, take a look at the accounts for yourself, see what you make of him.” It isn’t arrogant to want to share that. But it would seem foolish not to consider it, or dismiss it out of hand.

Christian Arrogance? 1

Aren't Christians arrogant to claim to know the truth?
[Lunchbar from Warwick CU - 1st instalment]

Imagine you’re in debt. No wait, that won’t take too much imagination! But I don’t just mean SLC debt and a student bank a/c overdraft. I mean that, and 13 credit card accounts frozen, your parents & friends have stopped answering your calls, and you can’t get a job. You just can’t get a job. Why didn’t anyone tell you career prospects were so bad with a Warwick degree in… maths?
One day you’re walking along outside, trying to think how to pay the rent on your room, when someone approaches you:
- Hey! You were in my year at uni, weren’t you? You were down the corridor from me in halls. Anyway, listen: I’ve got this ace job! They give you a house, a fab salary, they pay off your loans, they…
- What an arrogant… going on about what he’s got. “Who d’you think you are?!”
- No wait, I mean, I’m trying to say – you can have it too! It’s not as if I was qualified, mate – I did Classical Civilisations; remember? I couldn’t get any job, I was a mess; but they just gave me this one!
- Now look here, you say, I don’t need anyone’s charity! I’ll make my own way!
- Oh. But… um… you don’t seem to be doing very well at that, and truth is, it’s really great – it’d be wrong not to tell you…
- What an arrogant ejit! Who’s he to judge me? “Look, that’s your perspective. I’m not going to sell myself to some benefactor. I’m glad you’re happy in it but you can keep your charity & keep your truth: I don’t want it.”

That's far-fetched. But that’s something like what a Christian feels like when someone says, “Christians are arrogant to go round telling people their opinion.” Your Christian friend is thinking: this is great news – I’ve got to tell everyone: they could have it too! And you’re thinking, how arrogant to think you know what’s what and that I need anything!

But the thing is actually; your Christian friend isn’t claiming to know everything about what’s what. They’re not claiming to be sorted. They’re not claiming they know more than you, are more intelligent than you, or are better than you. They’re not claiming exhaustive knowledge, as if they know the definitive answers to everything and you don’t. But they’re just wanting to share with you that they’ve been brought to know God through Jesus – not through their own intelligence or skill – and he said he’s the truth. We want you to share that: it’s too good to keep to ourselves!

Perceived Readership

Or 'Why I don't usually post book reviews'.

I read a fair number of books, and both students I work with & other friends know well that I'm ready to advise on books at the drop of a hat (or, more conventionally, a request or when helpful). Yet I don't blog book reviews. I keep a rolling list of what I'm reading & have read on the blog, so you can always note that and ask me about it, but I don't blog book reviews.

This is because of perceived readership. When I advise a friend, a CU member or a relative, I know something of the context. Something of their background, their theology, how given they are to reading, what they enjoy, what they've been challenged by lately, and what challenges possibly face them. I can think of the book which would help, and why. I know of plenty of other titles which are marvellous, Biblical, helpful books but would not particularly help them at this present time. That is, I know to a fair degree of certainty that I can serve them well: above all, I can interact with them and work out which book will serve them best in the gospel.

In writing a review on a blog, however, I have no idea of readership. Therefore to accurately serve the Church (in the persons of my readership), I would have to put in so much explanation and so many caveats, that I get tired even thinking of it. Hence I don't post book reviews.

The one time I took exception to this went to prove the point: I posted some thoughts on a couple of books, including one 'Total Church'. I say, 'some thoughts' deliberately - they were hardly comprehensive reviews. Overall, I recommended the books, though for Total Church I possibly noted more by way of caveat than I did actual positive comment: very aware of the readership issue. I received some helpful interaction from one of the authors in the comments, and corrected / clarified a line of my post. When a friend in another local church mentioned the book with me rather critically, I was again reminded of how people in different situations read a book's emphasis differently (that is, of course, the value of interpretation in global, inter-generational, cross-cultural community - namely, the Church). She had been discussing it with church apprentices. Next I knew, one of them was telling me they'd analysed my 'review' of the book! Which just makes me more reluctant than ever to post thoughts on books I've read to the generic public domain. Now, if I'd been asked to join them in energetically analysing and interacting with the ideas in this book in person, that would be a different matter altogether!

There is a 'postmodern' reluctance to be judged by what we've put in print which is suspect. There is a 'postmodern' sickeningly-common cry of 'You haven't read him (w)right!' rather than engaging in discussion on the text in question.
There is a 'postmodern' doubt about being able to communicate at all, given our different frameworks of interpretation, and different ideological pre-commitments.

Yet because there is a living, true and self-revealing God who has chosen to interpret his acts to us in the medium of language, and because we are made in his image, I uphold that we can faithfully communicate and interpret. The postmodern mind more readily recognises the effects of sin in marring this: bringing doubt, confusion, and frustration in communication - both from the speaker and the hearer. (More readily, that is, than the modern mind - to ultra-generalise - which tended to think 'scientific', 'rational' means of analysis could overcome any problems, of communication or otherwise.) Yet the perversion of sin does not make communication utterly impossible or irredeemable. There is frustration, power play, domination, lies, deceit, and everything else found in Genesis 3. But there remains a living, true and speaking God who has not completely withdrawn his grace from the world and works redemptively throughout history.

Hence I will not cease from all attempts at communication (to the despair of some, no doubt), nor will I cease from recommending and discussing books. But I will be extremely reluctant to post book reviews generically, unless God gives me a lot of energy to note background, context, and many caveats, for a diverse readership.

Accented apologetics

I often hear surprised tones when I say I'm from Belfast. Of course, there are also those cunning or musical people who detect something odd in my accent and ask where I'm from. But for a more famous accent from Belfast, try Alister McGrath. Oh yes. [Like this, on Dawkins, to which I've been listening.] Born there 30 years before me, he went to the rival school to mine. Now when my accent gets like McGrath's, you'll have cause to question. He's got a book coming out, The Dawkins Delusion, in response to Dawkins' The God Delusion.

Is the Bible sexist? 3

Part 1: In the beginning, they were equal in dignity in God's image.
Part 2: Perverted rebels - why we are sexist & object to sexism.
The Bible gives the only explanation for sexism and reason for our objecting to it - we're both from God, but we're perverted rebels. But

The Bible not only explains out sexism, it judges our sexism.
The trouble with trying to claim that the Bible’s sexist is that it turns the accusation back on us. You who claim that we’re equal in dignity – yes, we are – but you say that while cleverly manipulating the men in your project group so you can get one up on them. You say male chauvinism is wrong and that the Bible’s sexist; while you pressure your girlfriend into having sex. You say the Bible is anti-women while you spend between lectures with your girlfriends alternately slagging off men or ogling male stars like they’re meat rather than people. You claim to judge sexism but you do exactly the same thing!

You may not like what the Bible says, because it says we owe God honour and thanks, and points out how perverted we are; but it’s laughable to try to take the moral high ground and say the Bible’s sexist. The Bible judges our sexism – because God cares about his image, about us who bear it, and he takes our distortion, power abuse, manipulation, sexist jokes – he takes it all very seriously. God’s word explains and judges our sexism and God will judge sexism when Jesus comes back to make a new creation in which we’ll have perfect dignity restored in perfectly harmonious relationships, respecting each others roles and goodness from God.

Now all I’ve said from the Bible has been quite negative of us.

We thought we’d take the Bible to court and instead we find it’s the court order
of the judge, declaring us guilty of sexual perversion in our very core
attitudes and thoughts, and pronouncing the judgement.

So now let me tell you of the only non-sexist, unperverted person who ever lived: Jesus. As we all do, the leaders in his culture had a distorted view of the dignity and roles of men & women – they even said that a leader or teacher shouldn’t speak to a woman in the street: even his wife! Jesus rejected that distortion.

• He initiated conversation with a woman and proceeded to tell her that he is the Messiah – something the Bible records that his male disciples didn’t understand till later!
• He’s financially supported by some prominent female followers
• He welcomes women to listen to his teaching like a disciple – when it was assumed that only men could understand God-stuff
• When he rises from the dead, he arranges for women to be the first witnesses, the ones who tell the (still rather confused) male disciples

Jesus didn’t treat women in the perverted sexist way of his culture or of ours – he treated them as equal in dignity and different in role, as his Father had designed.

So how is that good news? Great, so maybe one man wasn’t sexist. But that one man, not declared guilty by God’s word, was judged anyway. Not for his perverted attitudes, his sexism because he had none, but for our perversion, our sexism. And to anyone who asks to be counted in him, he gives new life – life to be transformed from our sexism, selfishness, greed, shame, corruption, rebellion, to be like Jesus: loving and respecting God and each other.

The Bible is not sexist: rather, it explains our sexism, judges our sexism, and reveals the only answer to our sexism.

Now, I haven’t covered the particulars – I’ve given us the broad sweeps so that now you’ll know a bit more of the context in which to ask questions! But before I take questions [leave a blog comment if you want], I’d like to challenge you – don’t drink in assumptions about the Bible and dismiss it: read it and see. Because sexism, perverting God’s design in us, and judgement, is much too serious to dismiss on the basis of prejudice!

Is the Bible sexist? 2

Part 1. They were equal in dignity and personhood, because they’d been made in God’s image. They were together with no shame, and God had said it was really good. So what happened?

We’re now in a world of sexist jokes, of slagging off the other sex, of power play, of manipulation... We’re in a world where, according to a Warwick report just out, 5 year olds give teachers sexist abuse! And the Bible’s real to this too: it goes on to describe not this good harmony of equality in complementarity but men abusing women, women manipulating men... You see, we got our dignity and equality from the creator: he was the source, and it derived from him. They enjoyed each other under his rule. They fitted together under his rule, as equals. But rather than enjoying that dignity and equality they got from God, they rebelled against him. And we rebel against him.

There was no sexism, no male chauvinism under God’s good creator-rule. But we decide that we want to rule; we want to decide what’s good. But you can’t rebel against the source of goodness and remain completely good!

You decide that your tutor doesn’t really want you to understand his subject better; he’s just being mean. Who’s he to say what’s good and what’s not? So you and a couple of friends depose your tutor, take over his office, and now you decide what makes the grade. You award A’s to yourselves, of course, and... pretty much everyone else. Well, that's all nice to start with, but are you actually good academically? Not without teachers you aren’t... and not if everyone else is getting A’s either!

If you rebel against the tutor, who declares what’s good and what isn’t, then goodness actually goes out the window. You get discrimination, or falling standards, bribery, and general corruption right until some other student deposes you in a military coup.

The man and woman rebelled against the one who makes good, gives good and declares good – enter corruption, power-play and sexism, stage left.

Same now: we don’t want our own roles; we want to usurp God’s role. And in doing so, we pervert God’s design. You’re worried about sexists? I tell you it’s worse: we’re all sexual perverts!

God said the gender war would start: they’d rejected dignity as God’s creatures so the man would be abusing his power trying to rule harshly over the woman; and they’d rejected harmony like God so the woman would be trying to manipulate the man for power. They’d rejected the giver of harmonious dignity so they’d attack each other’s dignity.

The Bible, far from being sexist, describes life as it is. It doesn’t cause our sexism, it explains the cause of our sexism. We know we’re equal. We know we’re different to animals: how many animals have seminars on sexism in society, or counselling sessions on relationships?! We know we’re different. We know at best it can be beautiful. And we know that at heart we’re pretty perverted.

Just look at the number of books in Smiths (probably even in the uni bookshop) trying to sort us out on sex, gender & relationships. For goodness sake, we even nod sagely when someone says, "It’s like... men are from Mars, and women are from Venus!" We don’t have to go so far to find why we’re like we are: we’re both from God, but we’re perverted rebels.

And we recognise the perversion only because there was a good plan to start with: the Bible gives the only explanation for sexism and reason for our objecting to it - we're both from God, but we're perverted rebels.

But the Bible not only explains out sexism, it judges our sexism.
The trouble with trying to claim that the Bible’s sexist is that it turns the accusation back on us.
But that's for the next post.

Is the Bible sexist?

Lunchbar at the wonderful Warwick CU (I did go all nostalgic, yes) on Is the Bible sexist? Now, as well as being my alma mater, Warwick's the uni with Germaine Greer on the teaching staff. Here's what I said (in installments!)

When I was asked to speak on ‘Is the Bible sexist?’, I was rather surprised. I thought, 'Sexist? But I think it’s actually quite positive about men!' Oh ok, I’m not going to get away with that. I guess you’re here because you think the Bible is sexist in being down on women in some way rather than men. You probably have questions about roles, and if you’re in the arts or social sciences your lecturer or seminar tutor has probably at some point voiced the assumption that the Bible’s sexist when you’ve been discussing a text, film or aspect of political history. Well, at university we don’t want to swallow assumptions unquestioningly, so if we’re going to make claims about the Bible, let’s look at the Bible to examine them.

I won’t deal with specific examples in the Bible because we need to get its big picture first – so I expect that you'll have questions about particular things in the Bible, to ask in the question time after I’ve spoken. In fact, I’m going to propose that the Bible doesn’t cause sexism but explains our sexism and judges our sexism.

First of all: the Bible explains our sexism.
Let’s go to the very beginning of humankind: Genesis (beginnings) ch1. The opening has a rhythm to it:
God spoke, 'Let there be...', it was, it was good, that was day 1;
God spoke, 'Let there be...', it was, it was good, that was day 2;
and so on, right up to halfway through day 6.
On day 6, God spoke, 'Let there be living creatures, according to their kinds,' it was so, & it was good. But that wasn’t the end.
God speaks again – and he doesn’t just say, 'Let there be...' but he converses,

"Let us make human beings in our image, to be like us. They will reign over the fish in the sea, the birds in the sky, the livestock, all the wild animals on the earth, and the small animals that scurry along the ground."
So God created human beings in his own image.
In the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them.

So right at the beginning, God decided to make creatures unlike all the others, to reflect him, able to know him, to relate, to communicate with him and each other. He made them male and female, reflecting him in relationship, equal in dignity and honour because unlike the animals, they were created in God’s image, to rule over the rest of creation. They together were given this rule, together were given creation to enjoy, together were commissioned to work – 'Be fruitful and multiply. Fill the earth and govern it.' They obviously had different roles in that filling the earth bit at least: but they were given the work together. Together they were made to know and honour their glorious creator. They weren’t identical: God had his plan of beauty in diversity and made not just a tribe of men with asexual reproduction or a tribe of females but a man and woman to complement each other. (Not 'You’re lovely Adam' 'So are you, Eve!' but they fit together.)

They were equal in dignity and personhood, because they’d been made in God’s image. They were together with no shame, and God had said it was really good.

So what happens? That'd be for the next post.

Freeeedom!

La liberté : jusqu'à quel prix ?

April's Focus (joint GBU) meeting in Brussels will be on the topic of Freedom: at what price? (More literally, 'up to what price/cost?') I spent hours on the flyer for it last Friday (and the printing shop have mangled it), but I'm rather pleased with this little cartoon I did for it. I'd have put the fish in a tartan kilt and had him crying "Freeeeedom!" in a Scottish accent, but I think that cultural reference just might possibly go over the heads of the Belgians.