Addicted to Prayer (and Atheists who Pray)

I took this photo of a Bar Mitzvah in Jerusalem.

I pray.

I research prayer and praying.

Hence, I'm interested in T.R. Luhrman's nytimes little piece "Addicted to Prayer." Here are some takeaways and to-dos for me.

• Check out the discussion "Should Atheists Pray?" Click on "Prayer Is Ubiquitous for a Reason," by Kevin Ladd. Go to amazon and look at Ladd and Spilka's book, which gets excellent reviews: "The Psychology of Prayer: A Scientific Approach." Put it on your wish list. 
• Note atheists who pray, and Luhrman's story of one who invented a "god" and prayed to it and found it beneficial.
• Luhrman writes: "Is there a downside? Should we all drop to our knees and pray? In general, I have to admit I’m impressed with the evidence." 
• Follow the rabbit trail to the Washington Post article "Some Nonbelievers Still Find Solace in Prayer." And the story of atheist Sigfried Gold, who out of desperation took up praying. God was in a lot of physical and psychological trouble. We read: "While Gold doesn’t believe there is some supernatural being out there attending to his prayers, he calls his creation “God” and describes himself as having had a “conversion” that can be characterized only as a “miracle.” His life has been mysteriously transformed, he says, by the power of asking." (Could it be that God responded to Gold's prayers?)
• Gold had a hunger for things transcendent. While there aren't a lot of real atheists out there, those I have met have this hunger. There's a big hole in an atheist's heart, a Pascalian abyss, that can only be filled by the transcendent; aka God. (See, e.g., Ross Douthat's Bad Religion, where he writes: "At the deepest level, every human culture is religious— defined by what its inhabitants believe about some ultimate reality, and what they think that reality demands of them." (p. 2)

Prayer Summer Month 3 - Join a Prayer Movement

It's Month 3 of Prayer Summer. Here, again, are the details. If there's anyone who would like to join me for August and make it a prayer-filled month, please send me an e-mail.

Prayer Summer began June 1. 

• I'm challenging you to three months of praying, 30-60 minutes a day, 5 days a week, from June through August.
• You'll be on my e-mail list. I'll be sending Prayer Summer people things I am writing about prayer, plus video clips of myself teaching about prayer and encouraging a life of prayer.
• I'd like to hear testimonies that come out of a life of praying. Prayer Summer people can submit testimonies which I may choose to post on my website (with your permission). 
• God's goal for me: mobilize more Jesus-followers into a life of actual praying.

If you want to be part of Prayer Summer and a Prayer Movement send me an e-mail and I'll add you to the group. 

johnpiippo@msn.com

Cost: $0.

Investment: deeper relationship with God, individually and corporately.

Prayer is: talking with God about what you and he are doing together. Prayer is: communication within The Relationship. Prayer is: conversation with God. Let the Great Conversation begin!

There's Nothing New in Reza Aslan's "Historical" Book on Jesus

Linda and I in Chicago

When Dan Brown's book "The DaVinci Code" came out I felt that I had to buy it and read it, though it was a wasteland of Christology (= no genuine scholarship was contained therein). But people were supposedly reading it, so I did too, in order to respond. I read it in two nights while in Istanbul, Turkey, suffering from jet lag in the middle of the night. A few weeks after returning from Istanbul NBC TV in Toledo did a half hour in prime time, interviewing me about Brown's book. I was ready to respond.

Now we have Reza Aslan's Jesus book Zealot, which is #1 on amazon.com. Which means people are buying it. And probably some who buy it are also reading it (remember that "buying a book" does not equal "reading a book"). Since I am concerned with the Real Jesus I am now hanging my head because I may have to spend 12 bucks to buy it, and read it. I am certain it will contain nothing I have already read on Jesus over the past 40 years (which includes doctoral studies in ancient Christology and ongoing, incessant historical Jesus studies).

So for now I'm reading reviews. The Chronicle of Higher Education has one - "Attack on Religion Scholar Puts His Book on Jesus in the Spotlight." Here are some quotes from this essay.

• Mr. Aslan writes in the book that he wishes to present "the most accurate and reasonable argument, based on my two decades of scholarly research into the New Testament and early Christian history."
• Which is... what? For Aslan, Jesus is an itinerant wandering preacher. But there's nothing new in that claim, as anyone who has read John Dominic Crossan et. al. over the years. So what else? Aslan says Jesus was a profoundly political figure. OK, if that means Jesus really ticked off kings and governments. 
• As many are noting, Aslan's "conclusions are not particularly new." Therefore I don't know if I should spend a few bucks and a even a little time reading it.
• But among the Jewish political groups, is it really accurate to label Jesus as a "Zealot?" Probably not. Craig Evans, a real New Testament scholar (and one of my favorites), "professor of New Testament at Acadia Divinity College, in Nova Scotia, says he suspects Mr. Aslan took too literally the metaphors and even hyperbole intended by Gospel writers who had Jesus say he came with sword, not peace. Much of the force of Mr. Aslan's account lies in his rich prose—he startlingly evokes, for example, the putrid smell from constant animal sacrifices in the Temple of Jerusalem. Mr. Evans sees Zealot less as a contribution to scholarship, however, than as a "personal interpretation" informed by "some of the scholarly literature.""

Today's nytimes has Ross Douthat's "Return of the Jesus Wars." [I like Douthat a lot, and much enjoyed his recent book Bad Religion.] I, for one, am glad for this, because the one I believe to be God-come-to-humanity is again and as usual on center stage. There simply is no more historically interesting and relevant individual than Jesus of Nazareth. Hence - another book on Jesus rises to #1. 

There's nothing new that Aslan gives us. Douthat writes: "Aslan’s book offers a more engaging version of the argument Reimarus made 250 years ago. His Jesus is an essentially political figure, a revolutionary killed because he challenged Roman rule, who was then mysticized by his disciples and divinized by Paul of Tarsus."

(Douthat refers to the now-notorious (and to some scandalous) Fox News interview with Aslan. See the transcript here.)

William Lane Craig has responded to Aslan's book here. Bill says:

• “Aslan has offered nothing new under the sun when it comes to offering a critique of the historical Jesus,” Craig said in response to Aslan’s book. “In fact, he is attempting to revert scholarship back to the early 1900s by echoing Albert Schweitzer’s book, The Quest for the Historical Jesus. Like Schweitzer, Aslan claims that Jesus is historically unknowable and we can never get back to the real Jesus.”
• “Additionally, Aslan makes an illicit, anachronistic allusion to Jesus and the Zealot party of the Jewish people. During Jesus’ lifetime, the designation of zealot merely referred to a person who was politically a nationalist and 'zealous' for Jewish independence. According to many scholars, it would be stretching it to claim that Jesus, or any of the zealots of Jesus’ time, were members of the official Zealot nationalist party, which wasn’t organized until A.D. 67/68.”

In general it's not cool to criticize a book until you have read it. Yet after reading Aslan's own statements about his book, and several reviews of it, the question for me is: to read or not to read? Surely I would never read it to learn anything new or different or illuminating about the historical Jesus. If, in the fall, many of my philosophy students are reading it [which will not be the case], then I may pick it up. So right now the answer is: no. 

:) 

 

Staying Praying (Prayer Summer)

Linda and I both have models, in our parents,of Bible-reading, praying people. Our parents persisted in praying for us, and we believe their prayers and example made a great different in our lives. In praying, do not give up. Keep knocking. Engage in "staying prayer."

Prayer and Letting Go of Control (Prayer Summer)

Prayer is, as Martin Luther King said, a "conversation with God." Prayer is conversing and conferencing with God God about what you and God are doing together. In the prayer relationship God remains God and you remain you. This means the prayer-relationship requires letting go of control and trusting God in what he says to you and how he shepherds you.

Gary Wilson Preaches at Redeemer This Sunday, August 4

Gary Wilson will preach this Sunday at Redeemer out of 2 Timothy 1:6-7:

6 For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands. 7 For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline.

Spiritual Formation at Payne Theological Seminary - July 2013

Spiritual Formation Class, Payne Theological Seminary, July 30-August 2, 2013

Meditation as Grinding on God's Word (Prayer Summer)

Payne Theological Seminary

I'm about to teach my last Spiritual Formation class at Payne Theological Seminary today. I'll again send the students out to pray, using Psalm 23 as their meditative focus. Add meditation on Scripture to your prayer rime. Psalm 23 is a very good place to begin, and to let God's Spirit build a house in which to rest.

Henri Nouwen explains the biblical idea of "meditation" as he writes:

"In and through silence the Word of God descends from the mind into the heart, where we can ruminate on it, masticate it, digest it, and let it become flesh and blood in us. This is the meaning of meditation. Without silence the Word cannot become our inner guide; without meditation it cannot build its home in our hearts and speak from there." (Nouwen, Spiritual Formation: Following the Movements of the Spirit)

"Masticate" - a strange sounding word meaning "to chew." It has the sense of teeth crushing or grinding food.

To meditate on Scripture is to crush God's words into the meaningful nutrition of God's heart-desires so that these God-thoughts become more than theories as they get assimilated into one's own being. As Nouwen says, God's Word builds its home in our heart. Only then can God's Word "speak from there." The fruit of Spirit-led meditation is that God's Word becomes "our inner guide."

Grind on God's Word today.

God Can Transform Our Weakness Into His Glorious Opportunity

Payne Theological Seminary

In December, 1955, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., gave what he called "the most decisive speech of my life." (The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr.; p. 58) On December 1 Mrs. Rosa Parks refused to move when the bus operator asked her to get up and move. She was arrested. Her trial was set for Monday, December 5.

Dr. King and other African American leaders called for a bus boycott. The following announcement was distributed:

Don’t ride the bus to work, to town, to school, or any place Monday, December 5. Another Negro Woman has been arrested and put in jail because she refused to give up her bus seat. Don’t ride the buses to work to town, to school, or any where on Monday. If you work, take a cab, or share a ride, or walk. Come to a mass meeting, Monday at 7: 00 p.m. at the Holt Street Baptist Church for further instruction. (Ib., p. 52)

Dr. King was asked to speak at the mass meeting. He writes of his experience preparing for this speech:

"I was now almost overcome, obsessed by a feeling of inadequacy. In this state of anxiety, I wasted five minutes of the original twenty. With nothing left but faith in a power whose matchless strength stands over against the frailties and inadequacies of human nature, I turned to God in prayer. My words were brief and simple, asking God to restore my balance and to be with me in a time when I needed His guidance more than ever." (Ib., pp. 58-59)

When this amazing, Spirit-led message was over, King describes what happens:

"As I took my seat the people rose to their feet and applauded. I was thankful to God that the message had gotten over and that the task of combining the militant and the moderate had been at least partially accomplished. The people had been as enthusiastic when I urged them to love as they were when I urged them to protest.
As I sat listening to the continued applause I realized that this speech had evoked more response than any speech or sermon I had ever delivered, and yet it was virtually unprepared. I came to see for the first time what the older preachers meant when they said, “Open your mouth and God will speak for you.” While I would not let this experience tempt me to overlook the need for continued preparation, it would always remind me that God can transform man’s weakness into his glorious opportunity." (Ib., p. 61)

Pray Psalm 23 Deep Into Your Soul

Payne Theological Seminary

I'm in my third day of teaching Spiritual Formation at Payne Theological Seminary.

In my class I send the students out to pray for an hour, using Psalm 23 to meditate on. There is a universe of meaning and life from God in Psalm 23. Carry it with you today. Perhaps... memorize it. Let God's truths sink deep into your soul. 

And pray...