About Me

Hi! Welcome to my space, where I hope to share with you some of my thoughts about life, theology and ministry. I am happily married to Sonia, and we have 3 gorgeous boys: Jack, Tom and Elijah. We live in the inner north of Melbourne, near where I serve as pastor of West Preston Baptist Church. I have a PhD in historical theology (on Karl Barth, who remains my theological hero), and I am currently studying towards ordination at Whitley College (www.whitley.unimelb.edu.au). In 2001, I published my first book, entitled 'Covenanted Solidarity: The Theological Basis of Karl Barth's Opposition to Nazi Antisemitism and the Holocaust', (New York: Peter Lang, 2001). In 2007, my next book, 'Barth, Israel and Jesus' will be published by Ashgate. I have also written a number of articles for leading theological journals, as well as for the forthcoming 'Cambridge Dictionary of Christianity', and the 'Blackwell Companion to Modern Theology.' I am passionately committed to inter-faith dialogue, to reconciliation, and to Jesus. I hope you enjoy this site!

The Barmen Declaration, 1934

Friday, June 22, 2007

Good Samaritans

In this past week, we have witnessed two very different types of response to crisis and emergency. On Monday, through the actions of Paul de Waard and Brendan Keilar, we saw a modern-day re-enactment of the Good Samaritan story. Seeing someone in danger, both men responded with bravery, compassion and selflessness. At the end of the week, we saw a completely different response to a very different sort of crisis. The Howard Government has at last decided to tackle the endemic problems of sexual abuse and alcoholism within indigenous communities.


But there is nothing ‘Good Samaritan’ in this response. No one can doubt the severity of the emergency. It is, quite simply, a national disgrace and the Government is right to act. Like Paul de Waard and Brendan Keilar, John Howard has rightly chosen to not ‘pass by on the other side of the road.’ But whereas de Waard and Keilar, and the original Good Samaritan in Jesus’ story, acted immediately, Howard has delayed his response. He has ignored report after report that have each stated how bad the situation in remote Aboriginal communities has become. And in the process of delaying, he has helped perpetuate the emergency which he now abhors.

As I have said, the Government needs to act. But a response of genuine compassion and bravery would have happened far earlier – not six months out from a federal election.

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Dalai Lama and inter-faith dialogue

Over the past week, a rather heated discussion has taken place between various Baptist pastors throughout Victoria concerning what our response should be to the visit to Melbourne of the Dalai Lama. A number of people have expressed the view that there is little, if any, difference between him and the prophets of Baal or Satanists. According to this view our response should be straight-out condemnation and a prophetic call to 'no holds barred' evangelism.

I have to admit that I have been extremely disturbed by such an attitude.
It seems to me to lag way behind the advances that have been made in both ecumenical and inter-faith relations over the past 50 or so years. After proudly proclaiming our progressive character, maybe Baptists are in fact, at least on this issue, 40 years behind Rome?!

Let me try to explain what I mean...

In 1965, as part of Vatican II, the Catholic Church issues Nostre Aetate ('In Our Times') - quite probably, the most significant document in inter-faith relations for the past 100 years. IN that statement, the Church explicitly stated that while:

"she proclaims, and ever must proclaim Christ as 'the way, the truth, and the life' (John 14:6), in whom men [sic] may find fullness of religious life, and in whom God has reconciled all things to Himself," nonetheless she "rejects nothing that is true and holy in [other] religions. She regards with sincere reverence those ways of conduct and of life, those precepts and teachings which, though differing in many aspects from the ones she holds and sets forth, nonetheless often reflect a ray of that truth which enlightens all men [sic]."

http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/

In other words, Rome issued both a clear acceptance of the historic faith, and yet als oan acknowledgment that not even the Church has a monopoly on the truth.

Similar Karl Barth (my theological hero!) has had some insightful things to say on this topic. Significantly, for such a thoroughly Christocentric theologian, Barth himself argued that we can expect to see evidence of diviine truth even in non-Christian religions. In CD IV/4, Barth says that we may expect to hear "true words even from what seem to be the darkest places..." There are "signs and attestations of the lordship of Jesus Christ, true words which we must receive as such...to be found with satriking frequency extra muros ecclesiae (outside the walls of the Church)."

Now I'm not suggesting that us Baptist pastors should become either Catholic or 'Barthian'! What I am suggesting is that we are in danger of tending towards an all-too uncritically dogmatic repudiation of all things 'non-Christian' (whatever that means!), that leaves us a generation and a half behind current inter-faith and ecumenical discussion.

This is not something we can afford to let happen.

I for one hope and expect to learn things - even spiritual things! - from those who do not profess Jesus as Christ. This is not to say that I take Jesus' claims of uniqueness lightly. Do I profess my own faith in Christ publicly and without reserve? Yes! Do I take my life of Christian discipleship seriously? Yes!

Do I think that those who 'in good faith' believe something else are not thereby 'saved'? I don't know...And it's precisely in that 'not knowing' that I believe we need to exercise a greater degree of humility.





Wednesday, May 30, 2007

Shameless self-promotion!

Hope that got your attention! Just a quick note to say that my latest book, Barth, Israel and Jesus, has just been published by Ashgate in the UK. It has had some very kind pre-publication reviews, and so I hope that you might check it out.

Take a look at the Ashgate website, www.ashgate.com for further details.

God bless,
Mark.

Monday, April 2, 2007

The Sign of the Cross

Most Protestants have long been suspicious of using the sign of the Cross in prayer or worship, and yet the practice of using this sign extends back to the earliest days of the Church's existence. There is a very interesting article in the February edition of Christianity Today which discusses this question - and which comes fairly firmly down on the side of recovering the use of this sign in our personal and corporate prayer life.

Take a look at http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2007/februaryweb-only/109-22.0.html

Wednesday, March 14, 2007

Why the Cross?

Ephesians 2:11-18
What does the foolish Cross of Christ actually achieve? What is the purpose of it? Why did Jesus have to die? At some level, many people are beginning to ask these questions in the lead-up to Easter.

My fairly strong suspicion is that these are questions to which we all think we know the answers. And yet the Christian doctrine of the Cross has been one of the most hotly-debated subjects in the whole history of theology. Theologians as famous and as influential as Augustine, Peter Abelard, St. Anselm, Thomas Aquinas, even Luther and Calvin, all disagreed on the nature and purpose of the Cross. And so if we’re not perhaps as sure of the answer to these questions as we’d like to be, then we’re in pretty good company.

In fact, I actually suspect that we have grown up with some misconceptions about the purpose of the Cross; misconceptions which have skewed our understanding of Jesus, our understanding of ourselves, and our understanding of the relationship between Jesus and ourselves.

When Mel Gibson released his film The Passion of the Christ in 2003, it was received with a fair degree of controversy. Jewish groups, quite rightly IMHO, argued that it perpetuated the stereotype of Jews as ‘Christ killers’, and in doing so served to reinforce two thousand years’ worth of Christian-sponsored antisemitism.

On the other hand, though, the film was greeted by many conservative, evangelical and Catholic churches around the world as a major boost to the cause of the Gospel. Churches from widely divergent theological positions found themselves coming together in agreement on this film. Here at last, it was argued, was a mainstream Hollywood film that did not shy away from the graphic horror of the crucifixion. The death of Jesus was depicted in gruesome realism, so much so that it was not uncommon for people to have to leave the cinema after fainting or vomiting: the violence of this depiction of Jesus’ death was simply too great for many people to cope with.

And yet, this thoroughly bloodthirsty film was hailed by many churches and church leaders as a brilliant innovation in evangelism. Why? Because, so the argument went, now the whole world—not least of all, the cynical world of pop culture—would be confronted with the full and awful reality of what God was prepared to do in response to humanity’s sin. Here at last, in high-definition cinematography, was a realistic presentation of just how much our human wickedness cost God. Here are just a few quotes from influential church leaders:

Billy Graham: ‘Every time I speak or preach about the Cross, the things I saw on the screen will be on my heart and mind.’

Darrel Bock: Professor of New Testament at Dallas Theological Seminary, has argued in favour of keeping the film’s graphic violence, because it ‘causes everyone to reflect on what His death was.’

Cardinal George Pell: ‘a spiritual masterpiece.’

Max Lucado: ‘The images and the authenticity left our congregation spell-bound. The message went right to the heart…’

Cardinal Hoyos: ‘This film is a triumph of art and faith. It will be a tool for explaining the person and message of Jesus…It will bring people closer to God…’


All this fits neatly into what is probably the most familiar view of Jesus’ death: that he died ‘for our sins’, as a perfect and necessary sacrifice. Have you ever heard anyone say, or perhaps you’ve even said it yourself, that when Jesus went to the Cross he bore in himself the punishment for every sin that every human has ever committed, from Adam and Eve through to the present day, and in fact to the end of human history. And more than that, his death had to be so horrifically violent, in order for the just and rightful punishment for every sin to be properly accounted for. Does that sound familiar?

In other words, the implicit message of The Passion of the Christ, as well as the implicit message that lies behind many of our own theologies of the Cross, is that Golgotha is primarily the place where God expressed His anger; it is the place where God displayed His wrath against the sinfulness of humanity. And why did He do that? Because, so the argument goes, God is a completely righteous and just God who cannot bear for any violation of His honour or law to go unpunished, and so He had to ensure that every sin ever committed—yours, Hitler’s and Pol Pot’s—was dutifully punished to its full and proper extent. And knowing that in ourselves, we can never make appropriate restitution, or pay the necessary compensation for what we have done, God allowed the punishment for all these sins to fall upon His own Son, indeed to fall upon God Himself. And so the story of Jesus becomes primarily a story of sin, guilt and punishment. The whole of his life is seen as being merely a prelude to the main event, his sacrificial death on the Cross. His teachings, his miracles, his way of discipleship…all these things are regarded as being of merely secondary importance; of having value only in the light of his death.

All of this sounds very orthodox, thoroughly evangelical. But is it actually true? Is this actually what the New Testament teaches? Just have a think for a moment about what message this understanding of the Cross sends. Think about what sort of image of God is presented through this idea. Does Scripture in fact reveal to us a God who is primarily a strict disciplinarian? A God who more than anything else, is determined to make sure that every last ounce of restitution and justice is squeezed out of the system? A God who puts the satisfaction of legal and disciplinary requirements before everything else, as His top priority? A God who at the end of the day is actually pretty bloodthirsty, because only through the enactment of an extraordinarily cruel death penalty on His own Son is He finally satisfied?

If we view the Cross of Christ primarily through the lens of sin, guilt and punishment, then we inevitably end up with this sort of God. And what happens when we do? If this is the image of God we have, then we cannot but help feel as though we are now doubly obligated to him: first, by virtue simply of the fact that we sinned in the first place; and second, by virtue of the fact that he sacrificed His Son on our behalf. Far from liberating us from the burden of guilt, we now feel even more guilty and indebted. If it wasn’t for us, Jesus would never have had to die! What sort of guilt-trip does that put on us?

When we are constantly told that Jesus died ‘for our sins’; that he took the punishment that should have been ours; that it was our sin that nailed him to the Cross; that it was our fault that the Son of God was forsaken by his own Father…Then how can we be surprised when we feel even guiltier, and even more obligated to try to earn back the Father’s love and respect and pride? And so, the very thing that should liberate us from the burden of legalism actually makes us feel even more compelled to win back God’s favour. No wonder, that even though as Christians we know we live by grace, yet in fact we are so determined to live by law. More than that, it’s no wonder that we so often view God as someone whose default attitude towards us is stern disapproval; that He is a God who basically expects to be disappointed by us; who is constantly waiting for us to mess it up, yet again. Instead of seeing Him as a God who expects the best of us and yet who will also forgive the worst, we tend to see Him as a God who expects the worst, and who gets mildly surprised when we do anything much better than that. No wonder we work so hard to try to earn back His favour, as though we don’t already have it.

Is this really the God whom we serve and worship? Is this the God of whom Scripture speaks? Is this a God whom we would actually want to have a relationship with?

So how does the message of the Cross become truly Gospel, truly good news, truly liberating?

It’s here that I think the passage from Ephesians sheds some light. According to Paul, the purpose of the Cross was this: that those who were far away from God would be brought near; that those who were hostile towards God and towards one another would have that hostility dissolved. As Paul says in v.15 of today’s text, ‘His [Jesus’] purpose was to create in himself one new person out of the two, thus making peace, and in his body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility. He came and preached peace, to you who were far away and to those who were near.’

Now certainly the immediate context in which Paul is speaking is the age-old conflict between Jews and Gentiles. It’s very clear, from this passage and from others, such as Rom.9-11, that what he sees Jesus doing is this: not removing the Jewish people from their relationship with God, but now also bringing Gentiles into that same covenantal communion. And so, in Christ, the dividing-wall of hostility between the two is broken down.

But there is nonetheless more to Paul’s message than this. In Paul’s view, what Christ preaches, and what God expresses at the Cross, is not primarily judgment or anger, but…peace. You see, the issue here is not us but God; it’s not our character as sinners that determines the nature and purpose of the Cross, but it’s God’s character. And what the entire span of Scripture shows is that God is not, in His essence, a law-giver or a disciplinarian. Remember that the Law at Sinai came after God’s commitment to be Israel’s God. The promise of relationship was first; the Law came second.

It’s not for nothing that the Bible says that God is Love. It doesn’t say that God is Law.

In other words, from the moment of creation onwards, both the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures reveal to us a God who is, first and foremost, lovingly, covenantally, freely committed to being with us and for us.

This is the impulse that lies behind the Cross; not so much the satisfaction of law or of legal requirements; not so much the holy expression of God’s righteous anger; but, first and foremost, that we will be brought near again to God.

That is to say, the Cross is good news, not because it tries to make us feel more guilty or more obligated to earn back favour with God, but because it tells us that we already have that favour with God, as His free gift to us.

The Cross is about the restoration of relationship; it’s about the proclamation of peace; it’s about the end of violence, not its consummation. That’s why The Passion of the Christ has it so wrong. The garden in which we are invited by the Cross to walk, is not the painful Garden of Gethsemane, but the re-created Garden of Eden. The Cross is about the re-integration of ourselves into communion with God, so that, as in Eden, we can once again walk with Him ‘in the cool of the day, unashamed.’
Amen.

Seeing Intently

Last week at our (new!) mid-week evening service, I spoke on Mark 8: 22-26, the healing of the blind man at Bethsaida. This is often interpreted as one of those rare occasions when Jesus' genuine humanity shows through, in the form of him making a mistake! That is, in this story, Jesus has to try twice before the man is properly healed.

You'll remember that the man who is brought to Jesus is blind; Jesus takes him aside, puts saliva on his eyelids, and asks him if he can now see. The man responds that, yes, he can see - but the people look like trees that are walking around. In other words, his sight has been partially restored, but things are still blurry. So Jesus has to touch his eyes for a second time, and it is only after this repeat-dose that the man recovers his sight completely.

The question is, though, is this really an example of Jesus getting it wrong, or at least, of not getting it totally right the first time around? Or is there a specific theological lesson Mark is trying to make?

The context, as usual, is helpful. Just before this event, Jesus and his disciples have been in the boat, trying to get away from the crowds. The disciples forget to bring any bread, and so begin to wonder where their next meal will come from. Jesus rebukes them for being so slow to understand. 'Do you still not comprehend? Do you have eyes but still don't truly see?' It seems that the disciples have been so focussed on the literal, physical question of lunch, that they have forgotten who it is they have with them! Their focus has shifted, away from Jesus and towards the more superficial (but more tangible) elements. This is exactly what the Pharisees have done earlier in their demands for a sign.

So, when Jesus and the disciples come to Bethsaida, the stage is set for a climax to this discussion of truly seeing what is really there to be seen - not just the physical, but the far more penetrating spiritual reality of who Jesus is.

In this light, it becomes interesting to read just what the blind man does. When Jesus first touches his eyes, the man looks around, to see what he can see. His focus is on the people around him - and, as he looks at them, he sees them as just blurry figures. But when Jesus touches his eyes for the second time, the text says that the man 'looked intently' - the word used here implies that he looked straight ahead. Instead of looking around him, he looked directly ahead - and as he did so, he would have seen...Jesus! No wonder, then, that Mark comments that, not only was his sight restored, but that he now 'saw everything clearly.'

The implication is that it was not just his physical sight that was restored, but indeed also his spiritual insight. All things - not just the world around him - now became clear. And they did so by him looking directly at the One through whom his healing had come, Jesus.

The blind man thus shows, not so much that Jesus got it wrong and had to have a second go, but that the restoration of true sight comes when we focus ourselves on the person of Jesus.

Monday, February 5, 2007

The Politics of Compassion

Last week, 'The Australian' ran an op-ed piece by senior La Trobe historian John Hirst, in which Hirst claimed that while compassion was all very well for churches and saints, it was precisely the wrong sort of quality we should want in our politicians. Compassion, he argued, is well-meaning, but altogether too trusting and naive. Public policy, on the other hand, needs to be somewhat more hard-headed. In defending his ideas, Hirst said that if compassion was used as a measuring-stick by politicians, then single mothers (for example) would have have no incentive to get off welfare, and would continue to chase after any 'passing blokes to father their next child.'

I decided to respond to Hirst's article, with the following:

"I MAY be hopelessly un-Machiavellian but, unlike John Hirst, I for one believe that compassion can and should be integral to effective public policy ("An unaffordable luxury”, Opinion, 31/1).

Quite aside from the utterly distasteful suggestions that single mothers are merely prowling around for “passing blokes” to father their next child, or that compassion is the sole preserve of “doctors’ wives and the Uniting Church”, I take issue with the notion that compassion is an “extravagance” that politicians cannot afford.

Such a view assumes that the quality of compassion is naive and wishy-washy. On the contrary, the truly compassionate person will resolutely stand up against oppression, tyranny and discrimination wherever they are to be found, and by whatever name they are being justified. Oh for more politicians who will do that!" (Letters, 'The Australian', 2 February 2007).

It seems to me highly appropriate that the hard-headedness of compassion become newsworthy, in the same week that we celebrated the birthdays of two remarkable people: Dietrich Bonhoeffer (German Lutheran theologian and martyr, 1906-1945) and Rosa Parks (civil rights activist, 1913-2005). Both Bonhoeffer and Parks were committed Christians, who lived and died resolutely in their faith - and both of them exemplified the tough and uncompromising nature of compassion.

Theirs, not Hirst's, is the message we need to heed and articulate in our own day.

‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for He has anointed me to bring good news to the poor, to bind up the broken-hearted, to announce liberty to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour’ (Is.61).