1
00:00:00,830 --> 00:00:02,950
Speaker 1: Hey, everyone. Welcome to this episode of Thinking Christian. I'm Dr.

2
00:00:02,970 --> 00:00:05,670
Speaker 1: James Spencer. I'm joined by Dr. Ashish Varma. And today

3
00:00:05,690 --> 00:00:08,490
Speaker 1: we are finishing up our series on Bart's letter to

4
00:00:08,510 --> 00:00:12,230
Speaker 1: the United States. And we're on the third question here.

5
00:00:12,630 --> 00:00:16,130
Speaker 1: And the third question is sort of like parts 3A

6
00:00:16,170 --> 00:00:19,710
Speaker 1: through E. There are five questions embedded there. And then

7
00:00:19,820 --> 00:00:22,780
Speaker 1: Bart sort of turns this around and he asks his

8
00:00:22,860 --> 00:00:25,259
Speaker 1: own question. And so I'm going to read through the

9
00:00:25,840 --> 00:00:30,319
Speaker 1: six A through B, the multi-part question that the folks

10
00:00:30,360 --> 00:00:33,460
Speaker 1: who prompted him to write this letter gave him. And

11
00:00:33,520 --> 00:00:36,680
Speaker 1: then I'm going to read Bart's response to them and

12
00:00:36,780 --> 00:00:40,870
Speaker 1: how he is sort of framing the question back to them.

13
00:00:41,750 --> 00:00:44,650
Speaker 1: And because I think the way he frames the question

14
00:00:44,690 --> 00:00:48,090
Speaker 1: back to them really does shape the rest of his argument.

15
00:00:48,930 --> 00:00:52,050
Speaker 1: So here was the third set of questions, we might say,

16
00:00:52,070 --> 00:00:56,340
Speaker 1: in Barth's letter to the United States. What is the

17
00:00:56,380 --> 00:00:59,280
Speaker 1: true function of the church and its ministers in relation

18
00:00:59,300 --> 00:01:03,820
Speaker 1: to this war? Should church bodies and pastors actively support

19
00:01:03,860 --> 00:01:07,550
Speaker 1: the prosecution of the war by preaching about the issues involved,

20
00:01:07,640 --> 00:01:10,250
Speaker 1: by urging the membership of the churches to serve in

21
00:01:10,290 --> 00:01:14,130
Speaker 1: the armed forces, to buy war bonds, etc.? Or should

22
00:01:14,150 --> 00:01:17,980
Speaker 1: they confine their activities to the timeless spiritual ministries? What

23
00:01:18,000 --> 00:01:20,450
Speaker 1: are the limits beyond which the church should not go

24
00:01:20,550 --> 00:01:24,630
Speaker 1: in identifying itself with any political cause? And in what

25
00:01:24,690 --> 00:01:28,570
Speaker 1: sense is it true that the church is not at war?

26
00:01:29,870 --> 00:01:32,730
Speaker 1: So those are the questions that Barth was posed, and

27
00:01:32,750 --> 00:01:37,530
Speaker 1: then he offers this question back as part of the letter,

28
00:01:37,569 --> 00:01:41,820
Speaker 1: and he says this. Is the church clearly aware that

29
00:01:41,880 --> 00:01:45,100
Speaker 1: its mission in every and therefore also in this time

30
00:01:45,940 --> 00:01:48,800
Speaker 1: is solely— and this in the fullest sense of the concept,

31
00:01:49,340 --> 00:01:52,410
Speaker 1: to preach the word of God to the mankind of today,

32
00:01:52,710 --> 00:01:58,670
Speaker 1: according to the Holy Scripture. Really interesting set of questions here.

33
00:01:59,030 --> 00:02:01,830
Speaker 1: And I think the way that Barth turns this, Ashish,

34
00:02:02,110 --> 00:02:06,280
Speaker 1: he is gesturing toward how he's going to answer every

35
00:02:06,580 --> 00:02:09,340
Speaker 1: single one of these questions that is posed in the

36
00:02:09,380 --> 00:02:13,760
Speaker 1: third set of questions. It's a very Barthian move.

37
00:02:14,860 --> 00:02:18,780
Speaker 2: It is a very Barty move, and perhaps it was

38
00:02:18,820 --> 00:02:22,040
Speaker 2: frustrating to the people who read it, as it is

39
00:02:22,200 --> 00:02:26,160
Speaker 2: to many people that hear Bart's way of thinking through things.

40
00:02:26,820 --> 00:02:29,480
Speaker 2: But I think for us, it's pretty instructive, and it's

41
00:02:29,500 --> 00:02:33,200
Speaker 2: a good climax to the sort of answers he's giving

42
00:02:33,280 --> 00:02:36,040
Speaker 2: to the first two questions. You can see a building

43
00:02:37,010 --> 00:02:40,670
Speaker 2: in his response question. Our mothers told us, don't answer

44
00:02:40,710 --> 00:02:43,010
Speaker 2: a question with a question. But Jesus did it, and

45
00:02:43,050 --> 00:02:47,910
Speaker 2: now Bart did it. you can see that building in

46
00:02:48,660 --> 00:02:51,540
Speaker 2: this fullest sense of what he wants to say. And

47
00:02:51,820 --> 00:02:55,060
Speaker 2: if we can encapsulate the first two questions in a

48
00:02:55,100 --> 00:02:59,359
Speaker 2: way in which he's really trying to nail home this

49
00:02:59,500 --> 00:03:03,140
Speaker 2: idea of the kingdom of God as the righteous state,

50
00:03:04,200 --> 00:03:09,050
Speaker 2: and the kingdom of God as righteous state just cannot

51
00:03:09,130 --> 00:03:13,730
Speaker 2: be identified identically with any state. The nature of what

52
00:03:13,770 --> 00:03:17,740
Speaker 2: a nation state is is by definition different because it

53
00:03:17,800 --> 00:03:20,700
Speaker 2: has a bound set, versus the kingdom of God is

54
00:03:20,919 --> 00:03:24,019
Speaker 2: theoretically open to all, to all who are willing to enter.

55
00:03:26,950 --> 00:03:29,750
Speaker 2: What might that mean now about a war, in this case,

56
00:03:29,970 --> 00:03:34,549
Speaker 2: that's bound to the idea of the nation-state, when what

57
00:03:34,630 --> 00:03:37,070
Speaker 2: he really wants to emphasize is the church belongs to

58
00:03:37,120 --> 00:03:40,440
Speaker 2: something else. It belongs to this righteous state or this kingdom,

59
00:03:40,460 --> 00:03:43,180
Speaker 2: you know, your kingdom come, your will be done sort

60
00:03:43,200 --> 00:03:45,390
Speaker 2: of a thing. And I think this is the beauty

61
00:03:45,410 --> 00:03:49,290
Speaker 2: of what Barth's doing, that he can answer questions, but

62
00:03:49,310 --> 00:03:53,440
Speaker 2: he refuses to be trapped within the parameters of what

63
00:03:53,500 --> 00:03:56,460
Speaker 2: those questions are assuming. So even when we talk about

64
00:03:56,500 --> 00:04:00,720
Speaker 2: an American church, that is a real thing if what

65
00:04:00,760 --> 00:04:02,960
Speaker 2: we mean by that is the church as it exists

66
00:04:02,980 --> 00:04:06,040
Speaker 2: within the boundaries of the idea of the nation-state of

67
00:04:06,070 --> 00:04:10,010
Speaker 2: the U.S. But you see hints in here of Barth saying,

68
00:04:11,100 --> 00:04:15,590
Speaker 2: That sense of what the American church is, while historically real,

69
00:04:16,190 --> 00:04:20,910
Speaker 2: is ultimately theologically trivial. Because what the church is, is

70
00:04:21,690 --> 00:04:25,750
Speaker 2: bound by another allegiance to a different program, to a

71
00:04:25,810 --> 00:04:32,990
Speaker 2: different operation within creation, that doesn't know the sorts of desires, expectations,

72
00:04:33,070 --> 00:04:36,750
Speaker 2: agendas that the nation-state has. And I think that's what

73
00:04:36,770 --> 00:04:40,290
Speaker 2: makes this interesting. a beautiful responding to a question with

74
00:04:40,310 --> 00:04:43,430
Speaker 2: other questions and then working his way through that. What

75
00:04:43,450 --> 00:04:55,680
Speaker 2: do you think about that? Can you hear me still?

76
00:04:57,430 --> 00:05:00,790
Speaker 1: Yeah, he does something at the beginning of the next page.

77
00:05:02,150 --> 00:05:04,450
Speaker 1: He says this, he says, you know, he's going to

78
00:05:04,490 --> 00:05:07,530
Speaker 1: take the liberty of proposing another counter question. And he says,

79
00:05:07,589 --> 00:05:10,770
Speaker 1: what is being done today in the church bodies, ministerial conferences,

80
00:05:10,830 --> 00:05:14,450
Speaker 1: theological faculties, but above all in the studies of the

81
00:05:14,490 --> 00:05:17,310
Speaker 1: individual pastors of all the dominations in the United States

82
00:05:17,410 --> 00:05:21,010
Speaker 1: to the end that the church shall again be the church,

83
00:05:21,970 --> 00:05:25,529
Speaker 1: understand itself as such and act accordingly. And so what

84
00:05:25,570 --> 00:05:28,820
Speaker 1: we see here in Bard is very much that he's

85
00:05:28,900 --> 00:05:33,210
Speaker 1: wanting to resituate the church as something unique and different.

86
00:05:34,110 --> 00:05:38,440
Speaker 1: This resonates with what He was extremely influential in writing

87
00:05:38,480 --> 00:05:42,350
Speaker 1: the Barman Declaration, if not the basically sole author of

88
00:05:42,390 --> 00:05:46,729
Speaker 1: the Barman Declaration. And so you see that in the

89
00:05:46,750 --> 00:05:50,849
Speaker 1: Barman Declaration as well, that Barth's concern is that the

90
00:05:50,910 --> 00:05:54,429
Speaker 1: church act as the church, that it be something different

91
00:05:54,490 --> 00:05:58,060
Speaker 1: and distinct from the state, from politics, from anything else,

92
00:05:58,120 --> 00:06:02,390
Speaker 1: that it's answering to God as its authority. And I

93
00:06:02,450 --> 00:06:05,420
Speaker 1: think your point about, you know, sort of the American churches,

94
00:06:05,520 --> 00:06:07,980
Speaker 1: while we can speak of it in that way, I

95
00:06:08,000 --> 00:06:13,400
Speaker 1: can remember when Stanley Hauerwas was named America's most influential theologian.

96
00:06:13,480 --> 00:06:16,760
Speaker 1: He took pains to make the point he wanted to

97
00:06:16,820 --> 00:06:21,280
Speaker 1: be most influential theologian in America. He wanted to make

98
00:06:21,339 --> 00:06:26,080
Speaker 1: sure that America was the location, that he was not

99
00:06:26,140 --> 00:06:30,620
Speaker 1: sort of prefixing himself as a theologian. And so he

100
00:06:30,660 --> 00:06:32,620
Speaker 1: has a whole riff on that that he does. And

101
00:06:32,640 --> 00:06:34,940
Speaker 1: I think Bart would resonate with that. I think what

102
00:06:34,980 --> 00:06:41,160
Speaker 1: he's looking for is not an isolated church, a decontextualized church,

103
00:06:41,940 --> 00:06:46,390
Speaker 1: but a church within a context. Not a church determined

104
00:06:46,410 --> 00:06:49,130
Speaker 1: by that context, but a church that is determined by

105
00:06:49,170 --> 00:06:52,750
Speaker 1: God and preaching to that context. And you see that

106
00:06:52,790 --> 00:06:54,770
Speaker 1: come out in all the rest of the way that

107
00:06:54,800 --> 00:06:57,510
Speaker 1: he answers each one of these questions. I mean, even

108
00:06:57,550 --> 00:06:59,950
Speaker 1: just as he's addressing the first question about, you know,

109
00:07:00,010 --> 00:07:05,150
Speaker 1: how the church should, you know, be thinking about the war,

110
00:07:05,210 --> 00:07:08,330
Speaker 1: he prefaces it with, if the church is really preaching

111
00:07:08,370 --> 00:07:11,270
Speaker 1: the word of God, then this will mean active support

112
00:07:11,300 --> 00:07:14,300
Speaker 1: of the war effort insofar as it testifies with a

113
00:07:14,360 --> 00:07:17,380
Speaker 1: clarity consistent with the word of God, that the carrying

114
00:07:17,420 --> 00:07:21,100
Speaker 1: through of this stern police action against Hitler's nihilism is

115
00:07:21,160 --> 00:07:26,080
Speaker 1: a necessary task of the righteous state. But that if-then construction,

116
00:07:27,140 --> 00:07:31,540
Speaker 1: really does reroute this question. It takes it out of

117
00:07:31,620 --> 00:07:35,800
Speaker 1: the position of politics. Hey, what do you think about

118
00:07:35,980 --> 00:07:40,690
Speaker 1: Hitler's politics? Hey, what do you think about Great Britain? Hey,

119
00:07:40,700 --> 00:07:42,770
Speaker 1: what do you think about the decision to get into

120
00:07:42,810 --> 00:07:45,730
Speaker 1: World War II? This is not what he's talking about.

121
00:07:45,770 --> 00:07:49,090
Speaker 1: What he's talking about is if the church is really

122
00:07:49,150 --> 00:07:53,420
Speaker 1: preaching the word of God, then this consensus around the

123
00:07:53,440 --> 00:07:55,370
Speaker 1: war is going to emerge and it's going to be

124
00:07:55,430 --> 00:07:59,090
Speaker 1: recognized as an act of a righteous state. It's going

125
00:07:59,110 --> 00:08:04,690
Speaker 1: to be recognized as commensurate with and in attunement with

126
00:08:04,790 --> 00:08:07,550
Speaker 1: God's word. And he does that in the first few

127
00:08:07,610 --> 00:08:11,370
Speaker 1: questions here, always coming back to the notion that God's

128
00:08:11,410 --> 00:08:14,350
Speaker 1: word is the governing presence here and that the church

129
00:08:14,670 --> 00:08:17,800
Speaker 1: is always acting in accordance with it. And that is

130
00:08:17,880 --> 00:08:20,880
Speaker 1: the basic guidance that he gives to the church during

131
00:08:20,900 --> 00:08:23,560
Speaker 1: this time in this back half of his letter.

132
00:08:24,100 --> 00:08:25,920
Speaker 2: Okay, in light of this preamble that you and I

133
00:08:25,960 --> 00:08:29,880
Speaker 2: have both attached to what Bart's doing here, right? With

134
00:08:29,900 --> 00:08:33,270
Speaker 2: the questions posed to Bart, we have his brief answer

135
00:08:33,290 --> 00:08:35,350
Speaker 2: to the questions before he says, here's what I really

136
00:08:35,390 --> 00:08:37,950
Speaker 2: want to ask. And now we've got our preambles attached

137
00:08:37,970 --> 00:08:40,550
Speaker 2: to them. So we've got a lot of material to

138
00:08:40,590 --> 00:08:43,390
Speaker 2: wade through here. Maybe it's worth just jumping into what

139
00:08:43,429 --> 00:08:45,570
Speaker 2: is it that he wants to say, right? What's behind this?

140
00:08:46,230 --> 00:08:51,530
Speaker 2: His question, is the church really aware of what its

141
00:08:51,570 --> 00:08:54,960
Speaker 2: task is to preach the word of God to mankind

142
00:08:55,000 --> 00:08:58,260
Speaker 2: today according to the Holy Scriptures? Do we get that?

143
00:08:59,600 --> 00:09:01,199
Speaker 2: And you can kind of sense a little bit of

144
00:09:01,240 --> 00:09:05,260
Speaker 2: sarcasm under there, maybe a friendly sarcasm of, you wouldn't

145
00:09:05,280 --> 00:09:09,440
Speaker 2: really ask this question if you got your ducks in

146
00:09:09,480 --> 00:09:11,970
Speaker 2: a row. That's a strange saying, by the way, ducks

147
00:09:12,020 --> 00:09:13,750
Speaker 2: in a row. If you get your ducks in a

148
00:09:13,809 --> 00:09:14,510
Speaker 2: row and you have.

149
00:09:16,410 --> 00:09:20,210
Speaker 2: A clear understanding of who you are, that your goal

150
00:09:20,230 --> 00:09:22,929
Speaker 2: here is not to be a recruitment body, in some sense,

151
00:09:23,530 --> 00:09:25,670
Speaker 2: for whatever the state's doing, even in a task like

152
00:09:25,740 --> 00:09:28,359
Speaker 2: this one, where he's saying there needs to be, as

153
00:09:28,400 --> 00:09:30,459
Speaker 2: we've already covered in the previous episodes, there needs to

154
00:09:30,500 --> 00:09:33,160
Speaker 2: be a response to the Nazi regime and what Hitler's

155
00:09:33,179 --> 00:09:37,179
Speaker 2: doing in leading them. But you get the sense that

156
00:09:37,340 --> 00:09:39,240
Speaker 2: even though there needs to be a response on the

157
00:09:39,280 --> 00:09:42,080
Speaker 2: national level, because of the way in which he understands

158
00:09:42,380 --> 00:09:49,179
Speaker 2: the local, national, the nation-state, As itself, at best, an

159
00:09:49,280 --> 00:09:52,580
Speaker 2: incomplete riff upon this larger reality of the righteous state,

160
00:09:52,920 --> 00:09:56,230
Speaker 2: the kingdom of God. If you get who you are

161
00:09:56,290 --> 00:09:59,530
Speaker 2: as the church, you know that your task is bigger

162
00:09:59,550 --> 00:10:03,569
Speaker 2: than this. So of course that means speaking in a

163
00:10:03,590 --> 00:10:06,750
Speaker 2: way that calls out the sort of stuff that we

164
00:10:06,770 --> 00:10:08,700
Speaker 2: see as horrible, but one of the things you can

165
00:10:08,740 --> 00:10:10,340
Speaker 2: kind of hear in the background that I think is

166
00:10:10,420 --> 00:10:13,939
Speaker 2: sort of the friendly sarcasm is that if we're thinking

167
00:10:14,040 --> 00:10:18,650
Speaker 2: about the church with regard to what its true mission

168
00:10:18,770 --> 00:10:21,980
Speaker 2: is and the true state that it belongs to, then

169
00:10:22,020 --> 00:10:26,079
Speaker 2: we can't help but see that the sort of thing

170
00:10:26,100 --> 00:10:28,780
Speaker 2: that's present in the Nazi regime is the sort of

171
00:10:28,800 --> 00:10:32,510
Speaker 2: thing that's present in every nation state, and it's present

172
00:10:32,610 --> 00:10:35,090
Speaker 2: in every regime of the world. So you're not just

173
00:10:35,150 --> 00:10:39,849
Speaker 2: simply saying, I back up what my state is doing

174
00:10:39,990 --> 00:10:43,280
Speaker 2: in response to this. You're calling out evil, is the

175
00:10:43,300 --> 00:10:45,440
Speaker 2: sort of idea that I'm getting from him here. And

176
00:10:45,480 --> 00:10:47,679
Speaker 2: calling out evil means, of course, you're calling out, even

177
00:10:47,720 --> 00:10:51,420
Speaker 2: if it's not in name, Hitler and the Nazis. But

178
00:10:51,460 --> 00:10:53,180
Speaker 2: in the process of doing that, you're calling out the

179
00:10:53,260 --> 00:10:56,500
Speaker 2: evil in your midst. And that could be on the

180
00:10:56,540 --> 00:10:59,110
Speaker 2: national level, it could be on the local level. So

181
00:10:59,140 --> 00:11:00,730
Speaker 2: you can sort of hear here that one of the

182
00:11:00,790 --> 00:11:03,610
Speaker 2: things that we brought up in previous episodes on this

183
00:11:03,650 --> 00:11:07,870
Speaker 2: topic is the quagmire that we find ourselves in with

184
00:11:07,910 --> 00:11:13,420
Speaker 2: someone like Churchill, who does some terrible things. that some

185
00:11:13,470 --> 00:11:15,430
Speaker 2: would argue, I'd probably be in that category, is every

186
00:11:15,470 --> 00:11:19,969
Speaker 2: bit as horrible as the sort of thing Nazis were doing.

187
00:11:20,270 --> 00:11:22,050
Speaker 2: So of course you stand up there, but the church's

188
00:11:22,110 --> 00:11:26,089
Speaker 2: preaching should also, from what I'm understanding, what Bart's saying here,

189
00:11:26,370 --> 00:11:28,950
Speaker 2: should also be calling out this sort of stuff, to

190
00:11:28,970 --> 00:11:31,670
Speaker 2: the degree that they're aware of it, obviously, what Winston

191
00:11:31,690 --> 00:11:34,970
Speaker 2: Churchill is doing. And then right down to the local level,

192
00:11:35,010 --> 00:11:36,850
Speaker 2: there's sorts of things in our community that we can't

193
00:11:36,890 --> 00:11:39,310
Speaker 2: lose sight of, where at the end of the day,

194
00:11:39,350 --> 00:11:42,150
Speaker 2: that's where the church is embedded, not ultimately as an

195
00:11:42,170 --> 00:11:44,930
Speaker 2: American church, but in the Hauerwasian sense, a church in

196
00:11:44,970 --> 00:11:48,650
Speaker 2: America in specific places, in communities that have issues that

197
00:11:48,770 --> 00:11:52,679
Speaker 2: continue to need to be contended with. Is that a

198
00:11:52,700 --> 00:11:53,699
Speaker 2: fair reading of Barth here?

199
00:11:56,980 --> 00:12:00,699
Speaker 1: I think so. And I think one of the concepts

200
00:12:00,740 --> 00:12:03,579
Speaker 1: that I would draw out of all that you just

201
00:12:03,620 --> 00:12:08,890
Speaker 1: said is it's this notion of allegiance. And in the

202
00:12:09,090 --> 00:12:12,990
Speaker 1: fourth question in this series, he asks about should the

203
00:12:13,090 --> 00:12:17,370
Speaker 1: church identify with a particular political party? And he gives

204
00:12:17,429 --> 00:12:21,460
Speaker 1: it an emphatic no, that the church should not identify

205
00:12:21,559 --> 00:12:25,400
Speaker 1: with any particular political party. And part of what I

206
00:12:25,460 --> 00:12:28,699
Speaker 1: see there is this is a splitting of allegiances when

207
00:12:28,720 --> 00:12:32,520
Speaker 1: that's done. That when you start to affiliate with these

208
00:12:32,559 --> 00:12:36,520
Speaker 1: other political parties, when you start to identify with them

209
00:12:36,620 --> 00:12:41,010
Speaker 1: in the sense that This particular political party now becomes

210
00:12:41,350 --> 00:12:45,370
Speaker 1: our political party. You draw it into yourself. You fundamentally

211
00:12:45,470 --> 00:12:49,730
Speaker 1: changed who and what you are, and you fundamentally changed

212
00:12:50,590 --> 00:12:54,690
Speaker 1: who you serve. And so there's a splitting of allegiances

213
00:12:54,750 --> 00:12:58,430
Speaker 1: that happens when you identify too closely with a political party.

214
00:12:59,350 --> 00:13:03,790
Speaker 1: That then diminishes the ability of the church. Again, I

215
00:13:03,809 --> 00:13:06,510
Speaker 1: think at Barth's reading, and I would tend to agree

216
00:13:06,550 --> 00:13:10,460
Speaker 1: with it, As we get more and more entailed with

217
00:13:10,900 --> 00:13:14,939
Speaker 1: these other sort of minor allegiances or split allegiances, it

218
00:13:14,980 --> 00:13:18,199
Speaker 1: becomes much more difficult for us to speak out against

219
00:13:18,380 --> 00:13:25,290
Speaker 1: those allegiances. And there's a book written on Dwight Moody,

220
00:13:25,309 --> 00:13:27,329
Speaker 1: and I'm blanking on the gentleman's name who wrote it,

221
00:13:28,350 --> 00:13:32,280
Speaker 1: James Findlay. He was making just sort of an offhand

222
00:13:32,320 --> 00:13:38,010
Speaker 1: comment about church in this deep era in the 1800s

223
00:13:38,290 --> 00:13:42,819
Speaker 1: of industrialization and urbanization. And he says something to the

224
00:13:42,880 --> 00:13:46,620
Speaker 1: effect of the church became so tied to the economic

225
00:13:46,720 --> 00:13:49,400
Speaker 1: structures of the time that it was difficult for the

226
00:13:49,460 --> 00:13:54,250
Speaker 1: church to speak out against those institutions and really lost

227
00:13:54,490 --> 00:14:00,520
Speaker 1: anything except the the personal moral standard sort of argument. Hey,

228
00:14:00,590 --> 00:14:03,590
Speaker 1: you should do your best practices in business. You should

229
00:14:03,630 --> 00:14:08,150
Speaker 1: practice your business morally, those kinds of critiques and exhortations.

230
00:14:08,830 --> 00:14:12,490
Speaker 1: But because it was so intertwined and dependent on the

231
00:14:12,610 --> 00:14:15,270
Speaker 1: revenue that was coming in from these business people and

232
00:14:15,330 --> 00:14:20,390
Speaker 1: from the economic situation overall, it lost its vision and

233
00:14:21,160 --> 00:14:24,920
Speaker 1: lost its sight, lost its ability to speak against some

234
00:14:24,960 --> 00:14:27,900
Speaker 1: of what was going on because it was too beholden

235
00:14:27,960 --> 00:14:32,450
Speaker 1: to it. And I think that that sort of situation

236
00:14:32,490 --> 00:14:36,210
Speaker 1: is what Bart is trying to avoid in asking these three,

237
00:14:36,910 --> 00:14:42,170
Speaker 1: in answering this set of questions. It's let's be beholden

238
00:14:42,210 --> 00:14:44,840
Speaker 1: to the word of God, Let's make sure that we're

239
00:14:44,960 --> 00:14:48,280
Speaker 1: actually preaching according to the scriptures, that we're aligning with

240
00:14:48,320 --> 00:14:51,230
Speaker 1: the scriptures, and that we are being an entity apart

241
00:14:52,300 --> 00:14:56,410
Speaker 1: while we're being an entity embedded. And I think that

242
00:14:56,610 --> 00:14:59,590
Speaker 1: that's a little different than the way we usually say it,

243
00:14:59,710 --> 00:15:03,290
Speaker 1: you know, being in the world, not of the world, right?

244
00:15:04,130 --> 00:15:08,330
Speaker 1: Because you're both and. You're an entity apart, but you're

245
00:15:08,390 --> 00:15:11,250
Speaker 1: embedded within a particular context. And so Bart does not

246
00:15:11,270 --> 00:15:16,400
Speaker 1: want to abandon that context. He rejects this notion of timelessness.

247
00:15:17,240 --> 00:15:19,140
Speaker 1: And one of the questions he talks about, you know,

248
00:15:19,380 --> 00:15:23,740
Speaker 1: that we're not timeless. We're in time. And so the

249
00:15:23,780 --> 00:15:27,100
Speaker 1: church doesn't have a, you know, sort of a timeless spirituality.

250
00:15:27,160 --> 00:15:30,430
Speaker 1: We have a moment to moment spirituality that we exercise

251
00:15:30,490 --> 00:15:34,330
Speaker 1: in time. He's very much wanting that allegiance to show

252
00:15:34,550 --> 00:15:38,530
Speaker 1: forth in an embedded context. And I think that he's

253
00:15:38,750 --> 00:15:40,990
Speaker 1: arguing that the best way to do that is to

254
00:15:41,050 --> 00:15:42,650
Speaker 1: sit subject to the word of God.

255
00:15:45,120 --> 00:15:47,119
Speaker 2: So the exact words that came to my mind as

256
00:15:47,140 --> 00:15:49,739
Speaker 2: you were, as you begun, what you were saying was the,

257
00:15:49,920 --> 00:15:54,000
Speaker 2: in the world of the world dialectic. Um, and I

258
00:15:54,060 --> 00:15:58,780
Speaker 2: think often in my experience, when the church thinks of that,

259
00:16:00,400 --> 00:16:05,190
Speaker 2: we're thinking really small scale. We're thinking ethical things, right?

260
00:16:05,210 --> 00:16:08,770
Speaker 2: So perhaps early to mid 20th century, the way that

261
00:16:08,810 --> 00:16:13,900
Speaker 2: manifested is don't dance. Don't go to movie theaters. Um,

262
00:16:15,650 --> 00:16:18,760
Speaker 2: don't listen to rock and roll music. And that's evolved

263
00:16:18,820 --> 00:16:21,240
Speaker 2: in certain kinds of ways. Some communities continue to have

264
00:16:21,260 --> 00:16:23,720
Speaker 2: it on that low level, sort of these things don't do,

265
00:16:23,760 --> 00:16:26,480
Speaker 2: but it always seems to entail there are the things

266
00:16:26,640 --> 00:16:32,280
Speaker 2: of the world and the agenda of the world is

267
00:16:32,400 --> 00:16:37,370
Speaker 2: tied to being attached to creation, right? World seems to

268
00:16:37,430 --> 00:16:42,010
Speaker 2: be a gloss in many Christians' minds on creation itself.

269
00:16:42,110 --> 00:16:43,870
Speaker 2: And I get it, right? Because we talk about our

270
00:16:43,890 --> 00:16:49,630
Speaker 2: planet as the world. But I think the point that

271
00:16:49,690 --> 00:16:52,670
Speaker 2: I hear you making, and I think the point that

272
00:16:52,690 --> 00:16:57,310
Speaker 2: I understand Bart making, is to reimagine what it is

273
00:16:57,350 --> 00:16:59,570
Speaker 2: we're thinking about when we say be in the world,

274
00:16:59,880 --> 00:17:02,320
Speaker 2: but not of it. That this isn't a statement of

275
00:17:02,380 --> 00:17:06,500
Speaker 2: abandoning creation, so it's not on one side saying, well,

276
00:17:06,520 --> 00:17:09,080
Speaker 2: you know, those problems belong to creation, we're looking on

277
00:17:09,140 --> 00:17:12,360
Speaker 2: higher things, and therefore we're looking on higher things, means

278
00:17:12,420 --> 00:17:16,770
Speaker 2: that we don't pay attention to social issues. We don't

279
00:17:16,810 --> 00:17:20,750
Speaker 2: pay attention to care of creation. We don't pay attention

280
00:17:20,850 --> 00:17:24,150
Speaker 2: to what could happen to the body when we should

281
00:17:24,170 --> 00:17:27,899
Speaker 2: be concerned about the soul, which is certainly taking words

282
00:17:27,980 --> 00:17:34,200
Speaker 2: of Jesus, but I think misappropriating them. Conversely, it seems

283
00:17:34,260 --> 00:17:37,060
Speaker 2: to me what's at stake here is the ability to

284
00:17:37,080 --> 00:17:39,740
Speaker 2: be able to say that in the world is a

285
00:17:39,780 --> 00:17:44,500
Speaker 2: statement of structure. You are in structures that organize creation.

286
00:17:45,560 --> 00:17:49,140
Speaker 2: The nation state is one of them. It's the most

287
00:17:49,260 --> 00:17:52,119
Speaker 2: obvious one in the sense of our current organization of

288
00:17:52,160 --> 00:17:56,540
Speaker 2: the world according to how we've carved up the land.

289
00:17:56,640 --> 00:17:59,670
Speaker 2: Here's the border. On this side of it is the U.S.

290
00:17:59,730 --> 00:18:01,790
Speaker 2: On the other side of it is Canada. Here's the border.

291
00:18:01,830 --> 00:18:03,030
Speaker 2: On this side of it is the U.S. The other

292
00:18:03,070 --> 00:18:03,810
Speaker 2: side is Mexico.

293
00:18:05,550 --> 00:18:06,250
Speaker 1: And you see the.

294
00:18:06,230 --> 00:18:09,990
Speaker 2: Effects upon creation of it. creation legitimately looks differently the

295
00:18:10,070 --> 00:18:12,729
Speaker 2: moment you cross the border oftentimes because now you have

296
00:18:12,970 --> 00:18:19,070
Speaker 2: different schemes for understanding the place that then import that

297
00:18:19,150 --> 00:18:24,300
Speaker 2: vision of the structure upon the ground. And Jesus clearly

298
00:18:24,340 --> 00:18:29,200
Speaker 2: gets that because he lives as a Jewish person within

299
00:18:29,480 --> 00:18:34,480
Speaker 2: an occupied Roman regime. And he gets that a lot

300
00:18:34,520 --> 00:18:36,300
Speaker 2: of the things that go on in this regime are

301
00:18:37,230 --> 00:18:40,860
Speaker 2: don't allow Jewish people to be Jewish people in some

302
00:18:40,910 --> 00:18:45,360
Speaker 2: sort of isolated setting, but instead they have to adapt

303
00:18:45,500 --> 00:18:47,920
Speaker 2: to whatever it is the rule of law is. And

304
00:18:48,160 --> 00:18:51,260
Speaker 2: you get hints of that at, do we pay taxes?

305
00:18:51,540 --> 00:18:52,540
Speaker 2: Whose image is on that coin?

306
00:18:52,840 --> 00:18:53,260
Speaker 1: Caesar's.

307
00:18:53,560 --> 00:18:56,060
Speaker 2: Okay, render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's. And

308
00:18:56,340 --> 00:18:59,720
Speaker 2: the implicit thing within that is, whose image is upon you?

309
00:19:00,000 --> 00:19:02,780
Speaker 2: Render yourself to the one whose image you bear, right?

310
00:19:04,320 --> 00:19:06,060
Speaker 2: And that to me is sort of a gloss on

311
00:19:06,140 --> 00:19:08,400
Speaker 2: be in the world but not of the world. You

312
00:19:08,480 --> 00:19:11,399
Speaker 2: recognize the structures that are at play that especially in

313
00:19:11,440 --> 00:19:16,690
Speaker 2: the case of a non-political church in the sense of

314
00:19:16,770 --> 00:19:20,730
Speaker 2: being tied to a political party, that the church just

315
00:19:20,770 --> 00:19:24,889
Speaker 2: has to accept as a given reality. We accept that

316
00:19:24,910 --> 00:19:27,660
Speaker 2: there are nation states. We accept that within this nation

317
00:19:27,700 --> 00:19:30,740
Speaker 2: state there are primary political parties and then some adjacent

318
00:19:30,820 --> 00:19:36,410
Speaker 2: ones that have minimal amounts of influence. But we don't

319
00:19:36,550 --> 00:19:41,520
Speaker 2: see ourselves where our lines are drawn by the nation state.

320
00:19:41,660 --> 00:19:44,480
Speaker 2: And that's what I gather is at play with the Hauerwasian.

321
00:19:46,010 --> 00:19:49,470
Speaker 2: I'm a theologian in America, not an American theologian. I'm

322
00:19:49,490 --> 00:19:52,780
Speaker 2: a church in America. not an American church. But that

323
00:19:52,940 --> 00:19:59,240
Speaker 2: doesn't mean an abrogating of responsibility within that place. And

324
00:19:59,280 --> 00:20:01,129
Speaker 2: so I think of, the way I often like to

325
00:20:01,140 --> 00:20:03,350
Speaker 2: think about this is we're to work in for the margins.

326
00:20:03,410 --> 00:20:06,410
Speaker 2: We feel the margins, not because we're essentializing not being

327
00:20:06,450 --> 00:20:10,940
Speaker 2: in power, but because we're again, our goals are different.

328
00:20:11,810 --> 00:20:15,389
Speaker 2: And our goals are absolutely related to creation and of

329
00:20:15,490 --> 00:20:20,010
Speaker 2: seeing the presence of Christ be the one that redraws

330
00:20:20,090 --> 00:20:22,709
Speaker 2: our lines ultimately. That's the kingdom of God. So that

331
00:20:22,770 --> 00:20:27,379
Speaker 2: creation in full thrives. But we live in a state

332
00:20:27,470 --> 00:20:31,480
Speaker 2: in which we imagine one reality that has begun to

333
00:20:31,560 --> 00:20:33,899
Speaker 2: enter in but is not yet consummated. We're not in

334
00:20:33,920 --> 00:20:36,860
Speaker 2: the new heavens and the new earth yet. And we

335
00:20:37,000 --> 00:20:40,680
Speaker 2: recognize the reality, the present, to seek out the margins again,

336
00:20:40,740 --> 00:20:44,640
Speaker 2: not to essentialize the margins, but to begin to poke

337
00:20:44,700 --> 00:20:48,790
Speaker 2: holes in the structures, poke holes in the ways that

338
00:20:48,830 --> 00:20:52,110
Speaker 2: we have a tendency to view the structure as everything,

339
00:20:52,670 --> 00:20:57,290
Speaker 2: as creation itself. But instead to show that we are

340
00:20:57,580 --> 00:21:00,540
Speaker 2: in this, we are not of this, look, there's something else.

341
00:21:01,020 --> 00:21:04,389
Speaker 2: And I see that as what Bart's doing here. And

342
00:21:04,430 --> 00:21:06,119
Speaker 2: the way that he's trying to call the church to

343
00:21:06,150 --> 00:21:08,800
Speaker 2: be conscious of real issues and to speak out against

344
00:21:08,950 --> 00:21:16,500
Speaker 2: real things without reducing itself to an agent of that structure.

345
00:21:17,840 --> 00:21:19,660
Speaker 2: In the world, but not of. Is that fair?

346
00:21:20,380 --> 00:21:22,719
Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree. I think that the reason I was

347
00:21:22,760 --> 00:21:24,699
Speaker 1: trying to avoid the in the world, not of it,

348
00:21:25,580 --> 00:21:28,879
Speaker 1: and I agree with the way you've construed it. I

349
00:21:28,900 --> 00:21:31,480
Speaker 1: think a lot of times, to your point, when we

350
00:21:31,560 --> 00:21:33,990
Speaker 1: think of in the world, not of it, We think

351
00:21:34,130 --> 00:21:37,250
Speaker 1: of those, you know, don't drink, don't chew, don't date

352
00:21:37,290 --> 00:21:41,560
Speaker 1: girls who do sort of mantras, right? And so we're

353
00:21:41,580 --> 00:21:44,399
Speaker 1: supposed to stay away from these, the evils of the

354
00:21:44,460 --> 00:21:47,100
Speaker 1: world that are trying to seduce us away from Christ.

355
00:21:47,940 --> 00:21:51,020
Speaker 1: But I think Barth is saying something far more profound

356
00:21:51,060 --> 00:21:55,840
Speaker 1: than that. I think he's also saying that even in

357
00:21:55,900 --> 00:21:58,859
Speaker 1: the world where there is a, we'll call it a

358
00:21:58,920 --> 00:22:04,140
Speaker 1: moral must, that the righteous state is right. to go

359
00:22:04,290 --> 00:22:08,670
Speaker 1: in and police what's going on with Hitler, that our

360
00:22:08,730 --> 00:22:15,190
Speaker 1: agreement with that must emerges from somewhere else. That it

361
00:22:15,619 --> 00:22:19,900
Speaker 1: comes out of an allegiance, not to the state, not

362
00:22:19,920 --> 00:22:25,100
Speaker 1: to humanity qua humanity, sort of in a humanitarian sort

363
00:22:25,140 --> 00:22:29,649
Speaker 1: of sense, but it's derived from a deep theological conviction

364
00:22:30,190 --> 00:22:34,300
Speaker 1: that we're living according to the scriptures. And I think

365
00:22:34,320 --> 00:22:37,720
Speaker 1: that that's a really crucial aspect of this, because otherwise

366
00:22:37,760 --> 00:22:40,159
Speaker 1: what happens in the in the world, not of the

367
00:22:40,220 --> 00:22:43,500
Speaker 1: world sort of scenario is we get to engage in

368
00:22:43,540 --> 00:22:46,740
Speaker 1: the good things of the world, the things that seem

369
00:22:46,800 --> 00:22:53,250
Speaker 1: like they agree with Christianity with no particular distinction between

370
00:22:53,270 --> 00:22:59,110
Speaker 1: the way these things tend to emerge. And I think

371
00:22:59,150 --> 00:23:04,080
Speaker 1: that's a real challenge here. as we think through the

372
00:23:04,240 --> 00:23:08,320
Speaker 1: issue of the in versus the of. There's a way

373
00:23:08,400 --> 00:23:12,260
Speaker 1: for us to do things that are, you know, somewhat

374
00:23:12,359 --> 00:23:16,250
Speaker 1: aligned with God's order as part of our nation. But

375
00:23:16,290 --> 00:23:20,310
Speaker 1: if we do those because we are, as I like

376
00:23:20,350 --> 00:23:25,169
Speaker 1: to say, settling for wholesomeness, we will ultimately end up

377
00:23:25,210 --> 00:23:28,140
Speaker 1: not pursuing holiness. And I think what Bart is calling

378
00:23:28,280 --> 00:23:32,739
Speaker 1: on here is Listen, church, be the church. And as

379
00:23:32,790 --> 00:23:35,389
Speaker 1: you're being the church, some of these things are just

380
00:23:35,410 --> 00:23:39,969
Speaker 1: going to start making sense. Like you're going to understand

381
00:23:40,050 --> 00:23:42,690
Speaker 1: now that the governments of the world need to come

382
00:23:42,780 --> 00:23:46,320
Speaker 1: about and act in this instance as a righteous state,

383
00:23:46,400 --> 00:23:50,830
Speaker 1: bringing judgment on something that is abhorrent. You're going to

384
00:23:50,869 --> 00:23:53,890
Speaker 1: understand that. And you're also going to understand that as

385
00:23:53,930 --> 00:23:57,320
Speaker 1: you're being the church, you have certain roles and responsibilities

386
00:23:57,359 --> 00:24:00,000
Speaker 1: with this whole thing. But it all starts with you

387
00:24:00,060 --> 00:24:03,959
Speaker 1: being the church, not with you debating the issue, but

388
00:24:03,980 --> 00:24:06,980
Speaker 1: with you actually allowing God's word to form and shape

389
00:24:07,020 --> 00:24:11,140
Speaker 1: you such that you are his people. And again, that's

390
00:24:11,160 --> 00:24:13,820
Speaker 1: sort of a very Bardian answer. You know, and it

391
00:24:13,859 --> 00:24:17,260
Speaker 1: sounds really esoteric and sort of complicated. And I could

392
00:24:17,300 --> 00:24:19,420
Speaker 1: see why people get frustrated and just be like, Bart,

393
00:24:19,859 --> 00:24:23,060
Speaker 1: why don't you just give us some practical advice, jerk? Like,

394
00:24:23,100 --> 00:24:27,070
Speaker 1: just tell us what you're thinking. But I think he's right.

395
00:24:28,090 --> 00:24:31,650
Speaker 1: I mean, I think if it doesn't start there, right,

396
00:24:31,690 --> 00:24:36,270
Speaker 1: if you lose that connective tissue of, hey, church, be

397
00:24:36,290 --> 00:24:40,230
Speaker 1: the church. Now, let's look at the downstream implications of

398
00:24:40,270 --> 00:24:43,530
Speaker 1: being the church. What you end up with is something

399
00:24:43,570 --> 00:24:50,210
Speaker 1: that drifts very quickly away from the word of God

400
00:24:50,830 --> 00:24:55,520
Speaker 1: and toward either conservatism, liberalism, you know, whatever have you.

401
00:24:56,040 --> 00:25:00,100
Speaker 1: I think that actually happened in the German Christian church,

402
00:25:01,180 --> 00:25:06,200
Speaker 1: where we see the lack of mooring that the church

403
00:25:06,320 --> 00:25:10,970
Speaker 1: actually has as church. It's now going to subject itself

404
00:25:11,030 --> 00:25:15,310
Speaker 1: to the state. It's going to put itself under the

405
00:25:15,350 --> 00:25:19,689
Speaker 1: authority of Nazism more deeply than it needed to. And

406
00:25:19,760 --> 00:25:22,500
Speaker 1: it's going to adopt some of the ideas and principles

407
00:25:22,619 --> 00:25:26,420
Speaker 1: of sort of we need a German church, an ethnically

408
00:25:26,500 --> 00:25:29,260
Speaker 1: German church. And this is an appropriate expression of our

409
00:25:29,280 --> 00:25:34,240
Speaker 1: contextualized witness. And so we need to engage in a

410
00:25:34,260 --> 00:25:36,820
Speaker 1: lot of these things that that Hitler and the Nazi

411
00:25:36,840 --> 00:25:40,550
Speaker 1: party are doing. like that sort of capitulation, I think

412
00:25:40,590 --> 00:25:43,650
Speaker 1: is what Bart is at pains to say to all nations.

413
00:25:44,330 --> 00:25:46,390
Speaker 1: These are things, or I'm sorry, not to all nations,

414
00:25:46,430 --> 00:25:52,330
Speaker 1: to all churches. This is the sort of surrender to

415
00:25:52,450 --> 00:25:54,930
Speaker 1: worldly authorities that we have to avoid. And the best

416
00:25:54,970 --> 00:25:57,170
Speaker 1: way to avoid it is be the church.

417
00:25:58,320 --> 00:26:02,780
Speaker 2: Yeah. There's a section early in his response questions that

418
00:26:02,800 --> 00:26:06,320
Speaker 2: I think makes this point in a really helpful way. Um,

419
00:26:08,510 --> 00:26:11,410
Speaker 2: He says, recently we read here in Switzerland a pronouncement

420
00:26:11,830 --> 00:26:17,090
Speaker 2: by 93 leading American Protestants, and we were informed that

421
00:26:17,130 --> 00:26:19,669
Speaker 2: this was a statement characteristic of the majority of the

422
00:26:19,690 --> 00:26:23,469
Speaker 2: American churches. In this statement is the sentence, quote, we

423
00:26:23,510 --> 00:26:27,050
Speaker 2: abhor war, but upon the outcome of this war depends

424
00:26:27,090 --> 00:26:30,210
Speaker 2: the realization of Christian principles to which no Christian can

425
00:26:30,260 --> 00:26:34,439
Speaker 2: be indifferent, end quote. Barth then returns, I venture to

426
00:26:34,520 --> 00:26:38,359
Speaker 2: doubt that this is the unequivocal language appropriate to God's word,

427
00:26:38,760 --> 00:26:43,720
Speaker 2: which should be employed today. And we've heard this, I'm

428
00:26:43,780 --> 00:26:45,459
Speaker 2: sure you have, I've heard this kind of talk all

429
00:26:45,480 --> 00:26:48,400
Speaker 2: the time, right? It's equivalent to, this is the most

430
00:26:48,500 --> 00:26:50,780
Speaker 2: crucial election. And there might be good reason to say

431
00:26:50,820 --> 00:26:53,379
Speaker 2: this is an important election because of X, Y, and Z.

432
00:26:53,920 --> 00:26:56,370
Speaker 2: But we often hear, this is the most crucial election.

433
00:26:56,510 --> 00:26:59,690
Speaker 2: Or we've both heard, we need, fill in the blank,

434
00:26:59,810 --> 00:27:04,340
Speaker 2: God's institution. to be this institution more than ever before.

435
00:27:05,000 --> 00:27:09,879
Speaker 2: God needs this to happen, right? It's an elevation of

436
00:27:11,000 --> 00:27:14,330
Speaker 2: a particular institute tethered to the idea of in order

437
00:27:14,380 --> 00:27:19,230
Speaker 2: to ensure that the American environment continues to be this

438
00:27:21,869 --> 00:27:25,800
Speaker 2: superlative notion of God's place, which is failing to make

439
00:27:25,840 --> 00:27:29,830
Speaker 2: that distinction between a nation-state And again, what Barth terms

440
00:27:29,869 --> 00:27:32,670
Speaker 2: the righteous state or the kingdom of God. All right, continuing,

441
00:27:32,690 --> 00:27:36,429
Speaker 2: he says, I venture to doubt that this is the

442
00:27:36,530 --> 00:27:41,010
Speaker 2: unequivocal language appropriate to God's word, which should be employed today.

443
00:27:41,369 --> 00:27:44,510
Speaker 2: If the realization of Christian principles depends upon the outcome

444
00:27:44,530 --> 00:27:47,310
Speaker 2: of this war, then there is no point in the

445
00:27:47,350 --> 00:27:52,010
Speaker 2: assurance that war is abhorrent, for it is surely only

446
00:27:52,109 --> 00:27:56,230
Speaker 2: unnecessary and unjust wars which are condemned as abhorrent, and

447
00:27:56,290 --> 00:27:59,280
Speaker 2: among this Among this number, the present one is not

448
00:27:59,340 --> 00:28:02,530
Speaker 2: really to be classed. If, conversely, war as such is

449
00:28:02,609 --> 00:28:05,949
Speaker 2: really condemned, then the realization of Christian principles must definitely

450
00:28:06,070 --> 00:28:09,270
Speaker 2: not be made dependent on its outcome. That would mean

451
00:28:09,310 --> 00:28:12,060
Speaker 2: the determination to do evil in violation of conscience in

452
00:28:12,140 --> 00:28:16,600
Speaker 2: order that good may result. What is he getting at

453
00:28:16,640 --> 00:28:19,820
Speaker 2: right there? He's trying to strip away, I think, the

454
00:28:19,900 --> 00:28:25,450
Speaker 2: language that remains hidden underneath or it shows our alliances

455
00:28:25,570 --> 00:28:27,470
Speaker 2: that make us not the church in America, but the

456
00:28:27,510 --> 00:28:33,180
Speaker 2: American church, such that we're really concerned with a particular

457
00:28:33,300 --> 00:28:37,860
Speaker 2: idea of civilization being upheld. And that's what makes this

458
00:28:37,980 --> 00:28:41,680
Speaker 2: war that otherwise would be abhorrent just, because that enables

459
00:28:41,820 --> 00:28:44,880
Speaker 2: us to be able to uphold this idea of civilization.

460
00:28:45,540 --> 00:28:48,950
Speaker 2: And this idea of civilization is ultimately necessary for the

461
00:28:49,070 --> 00:28:52,890
Speaker 2: unpacking of the kingdom of God. That's the idea that

462
00:28:53,350 --> 00:28:55,630
Speaker 2: Bart's pulling out and that he's also reacting to, where

463
00:28:55,670 --> 00:28:58,580
Speaker 2: he wants to say no. So I might say that

464
00:28:58,660 --> 00:29:03,780
Speaker 2: he is implicitly articulating an understanding of divine providence where

465
00:29:03,800 --> 00:29:09,040
Speaker 2: things could look really bad, things could look terrible, and

466
00:29:09,080 --> 00:29:15,150
Speaker 2: that doesn't mean we've undone the providence of God. Things

467
00:29:15,230 --> 00:29:17,510
Speaker 2: could have gone in a different way where the allies

468
00:29:17,570 --> 00:29:19,810
Speaker 2: lost that war, and I can hear Bart saying within

469
00:29:19,870 --> 00:29:23,860
Speaker 2: this that The goal here wasn't to ensure the way

470
00:29:23,900 --> 00:29:27,780
Speaker 2: of life of the so-called Western world. The goal here

471
00:29:27,820 --> 00:29:31,719
Speaker 2: was to stand up against something that was horrific. And

472
00:29:31,780 --> 00:29:35,570
Speaker 2: whether or not those who stood up succeed, and whether

473
00:29:35,590 --> 00:29:40,030
Speaker 2: or not their notion of civilization moves forward, is sort of...

474
00:29:40,100 --> 00:29:42,320
Speaker 2: of a secondary issue to the real issue. And the

475
00:29:42,360 --> 00:29:45,200
Speaker 2: real issue is the gospel entails that we stand up

476
00:29:45,400 --> 00:29:48,110
Speaker 2: against certain things because this is the sort of work

477
00:29:48,330 --> 00:29:51,150
Speaker 2: that Jesus does in his work of reconciliation. It's not

478
00:29:51,270 --> 00:29:53,390
Speaker 2: just to draw people back to himself, but it's in

479
00:29:53,430 --> 00:29:58,000
Speaker 2: the process to call what is evil, evil. and to

480
00:29:58,060 --> 00:30:00,160
Speaker 2: stand against it and to place his very body in

481
00:30:00,200 --> 00:30:02,490
Speaker 2: that way. And you can see him now calling the church,

482
00:30:02,590 --> 00:30:04,610
Speaker 2: and that's what he says in his next point after that.

483
00:30:05,830 --> 00:30:07,470
Speaker 2: You can see him calling for the church to say,

484
00:30:07,490 --> 00:30:10,730
Speaker 2: this is why we stand up, because we are doing

485
00:30:10,790 --> 00:30:16,320
Speaker 2: a work that these allies are, in this case, allied with,

486
00:30:16,940 --> 00:30:20,960
Speaker 2: even if not intent. And that work is to place

487
00:30:21,040 --> 00:30:25,390
Speaker 2: ourselves right in the midst of of the work of reconciliation,

488
00:30:25,550 --> 00:30:27,830
Speaker 2: to participate in the work of reconciliation of Jesus by

489
00:30:27,890 --> 00:30:29,370
Speaker 2: standing up to what is truly evil.

490
00:30:33,720 --> 00:30:36,140
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I think two things. Number one, I

491
00:30:36,180 --> 00:30:41,140
Speaker 1: think it's easy for people listening and reading Barth to

492
00:30:41,200 --> 00:30:48,170
Speaker 1: be frustrated by his theological precision. I think there's a

493
00:30:48,230 --> 00:30:51,630
Speaker 1: sense in which And, you know, when I try to

494
00:30:51,670 --> 00:30:53,730
Speaker 1: wade through the church dogmatics, you get a lot of

495
00:30:53,810 --> 00:30:58,130
Speaker 1: you get a fair amount of this. Right. For sure. Yeah.

496
00:30:58,310 --> 00:31:01,850
Speaker 1: It's part of the reason I really. Yeah. It's part

497
00:31:01,890 --> 00:31:04,610
Speaker 1: of the reason I really like these shorter pieces from

498
00:31:04,650 --> 00:31:07,410
Speaker 1: Barth that are more occasional, because I think he I

499
00:31:07,450 --> 00:31:12,670
Speaker 1: think his theological precision hits harder in these letters. But

500
00:31:12,840 --> 00:31:17,000
Speaker 1: that's directed at real issues. It's directed at real issues.

501
00:31:17,040 --> 00:31:20,310
Speaker 1: And I think that section you read, people couldn't. listen

502
00:31:20,330 --> 00:31:24,870
Speaker 1: to that and feel like, hey, Bart's just playing word games.

503
00:31:26,030 --> 00:31:28,690
Speaker 1: But the reality is he is actually trying to get

504
00:31:28,910 --> 00:31:32,190
Speaker 1: at an underlying dynamic. He's trying to root out assumptions

505
00:31:32,230 --> 00:31:36,640
Speaker 1: that are just sitting there and allowing for this sort

506
00:31:36,740 --> 00:31:44,380
Speaker 1: of loose quasi-theological assertions that we all nod our head

507
00:31:44,440 --> 00:31:49,310
Speaker 1: to and go, yep, yep, but never actually examine. And

508
00:31:49,330 --> 00:31:52,090
Speaker 1: I think it's a really important role that he's playing

509
00:31:52,250 --> 00:31:55,830
Speaker 1: as he's addressing some of these issues here. I would

510
00:31:55,870 --> 00:32:01,870
Speaker 1: also agree that when Bart's looking at this overall, he

511
00:32:01,950 --> 00:32:04,510
Speaker 1: is not looking at it in terms of a cause

512
00:32:04,550 --> 00:32:08,650
Speaker 1: and effect. He's not looking at it as an instrumental

513
00:32:08,730 --> 00:32:12,140
Speaker 1: war necessarily. He's looking at it from a very much

514
00:32:12,380 --> 00:32:17,160
Speaker 1: a do what is right regardless of the outcome sort

515
00:32:17,200 --> 00:32:20,270
Speaker 1: of war. And so to your point, I think, yes,

516
00:32:20,330 --> 00:32:23,040
Speaker 1: the allies could have lost the war. And he would

517
00:32:23,080 --> 00:32:24,980
Speaker 1: not sit back and go, ah, we shouldn't have fought it.

518
00:32:25,000 --> 00:32:27,980
Speaker 1: I guess I was wrong. He would say, we fought,

519
00:32:28,140 --> 00:32:31,000
Speaker 1: we tried. That's what we're called to do. And now

520
00:32:31,040 --> 00:32:34,940
Speaker 1: we're living with the consequences of this other regime winning.

521
00:32:35,830 --> 00:32:39,550
Speaker 1: But there is no sense in BART that a loss

522
00:32:40,550 --> 00:32:45,580
Speaker 1: should have prompted different actions. And I'd say the last

523
00:32:45,620 --> 00:32:49,240
Speaker 1: thing that maybe we should probably unpack a little bit is,

524
00:32:49,260 --> 00:32:52,540
Speaker 1: you know, when you say the allies are now allied

525
00:32:52,840 --> 00:32:56,040
Speaker 1: in this instance, right, with sort of something that the

526
00:32:56,100 --> 00:32:59,560
Speaker 1: church would agree with. I think that's a very difficult

527
00:32:59,640 --> 00:33:02,459
Speaker 1: point for people to navigate because what we see is

528
00:33:02,500 --> 00:33:06,660
Speaker 1: we see humanity living into the good, the true, and

529
00:33:06,680 --> 00:33:11,350
Speaker 1: the beautiful. They're attuned now with God's order to a

530
00:33:11,400 --> 00:33:15,230
Speaker 1: certain degree. even if they're not loyal to God, they

531
00:33:15,410 --> 00:33:19,470
Speaker 1: are acting. And this is where we go back to,

532
00:33:19,490 --> 00:33:24,760
Speaker 1: I mentioned Oliver O'Donovan last episode, I think. He calls

533
00:33:24,840 --> 00:33:27,340
Speaker 1: the nation state, you know, and the governing authorities, the

534
00:33:27,420 --> 00:33:33,640
Speaker 1: secondary witness or a secondary theater of God's glory, right?

535
00:33:34,160 --> 00:33:36,520
Speaker 1: And I think the idea here is just this. It's

536
00:33:36,580 --> 00:33:40,790
Speaker 1: that the pursuit of something good and right and just

537
00:33:40,810 --> 00:33:51,180
Speaker 1: is even when motivated by emotions, intellect, rationality that excludes

538
00:33:51,250 --> 00:33:59,250
Speaker 1: God from the picture, is something that Christians should recognize, acknowledge, affirm,

539
00:34:00,210 --> 00:34:03,980
Speaker 1: and point beyond. And so I think for Barth, yeah,

540
00:34:04,180 --> 00:34:07,360
Speaker 1: he's looking at it and saying, yes, in this instance,

541
00:34:07,520 --> 00:34:11,700
Speaker 1: these states are acting as the righteous state. but only

542
00:34:11,739 --> 00:34:14,520
Speaker 1: in this instance. And he doesn't want to expand that to,

543
00:34:15,060 --> 00:34:20,440
Speaker 1: this is the righteous state. It's a, they're doing what

544
00:34:20,480 --> 00:34:24,680
Speaker 1: the righteous state is to do. Right. But that is

545
00:34:24,760 --> 00:34:28,500
Speaker 1: very different than saying church be the church. He's not

546
00:34:28,540 --> 00:34:31,719
Speaker 1: suggesting that the allies are the righteous state. He's just

547
00:34:31,760 --> 00:34:34,680
Speaker 1: saying that they're acting along the line that the righteous

548
00:34:35,090 --> 00:34:38,630
Speaker 1: state should act in this instance and would not hold

549
00:34:38,690 --> 00:34:46,440
Speaker 1: it beyond this instance. It's a very in-time argument. I

550
00:34:46,780 --> 00:34:51,630
Speaker 1: think that that is difficult for people to parse because

551
00:34:51,870 --> 00:34:56,549
Speaker 1: we tend to want to– I remember Daniel Kahneman wrote this.

552
00:34:57,450 --> 00:35:01,009
Speaker 1: He wrote Thinking Fast and Slow. It was a book

553
00:35:01,210 --> 00:35:06,700
Speaker 1: on cognitive psych and decision-making. He talks about the halo effect.

554
00:35:07,420 --> 00:35:09,680
Speaker 1: We want people to be all good or all bad.

555
00:35:09,739 --> 00:35:11,720
Speaker 1: And he's actually got a line in there that says,

556
00:35:12,160 --> 00:35:14,129
Speaker 1: you know, you don't want to think that Hitler loved

557
00:35:14,210 --> 00:35:19,069
Speaker 1: puppies and babies. You just don't want that. You want

558
00:35:19,090 --> 00:35:22,690
Speaker 1: this guy to be full on evil. But the reality

559
00:35:22,870 --> 00:35:25,110
Speaker 1: is that most of us are a mix of these things,

560
00:35:25,910 --> 00:35:29,270
Speaker 1: that we do have good character traits and bad character traits,

561
00:35:29,730 --> 00:35:33,380
Speaker 1: and that we shouldn't be totalizing one way or another necessarily.

562
00:35:34,340 --> 00:35:38,350
Speaker 1: We should be operating in as Bart's talking about here,

563
00:35:38,570 --> 00:35:42,840
Speaker 1: in this instance, this needs to happen. But after this happens,

564
00:35:43,320 --> 00:35:45,620
Speaker 1: that does not mean that these nation states that were

565
00:35:45,700 --> 00:35:47,819
Speaker 1: allies get, you know, sort of a carte blanche to

566
00:35:47,840 --> 00:35:49,920
Speaker 1: do whatever the heck they want because they acted as

567
00:35:49,960 --> 00:35:52,860
Speaker 1: the righteous state right now. And I think part of

568
00:35:52,880 --> 00:35:54,840
Speaker 1: the reason that he wants to keep the church separate

569
00:35:54,860 --> 00:35:58,940
Speaker 1: from these things is so that the church can retain

570
00:35:59,040 --> 00:36:05,379
Speaker 1: a degree of objectivity and judgment, right? about where these

571
00:36:05,460 --> 00:36:09,800
Speaker 1: nation states fall because they are not to be aligned

572
00:36:09,840 --> 00:36:13,629
Speaker 1: with the nation states in every instance, we might say.

573
00:36:15,710 --> 00:36:20,650
Speaker 2: So to your point, you mentioned the timeless bit, that

574
00:36:20,690 --> 00:36:22,529
Speaker 2: we are in time and the church is in time

575
00:36:22,610 --> 00:36:25,250
Speaker 2: and the states are in time. That's the third point

576
00:36:25,270 --> 00:36:28,279
Speaker 2: that he makes in his own response to his own

577
00:36:28,320 --> 00:36:31,500
Speaker 2: question back, where he says, when the church is truly

578
00:36:31,560 --> 00:36:33,700
Speaker 2: preaching the word of God, To the man of today,

579
00:36:33,739 --> 00:36:36,839
Speaker 2: there can be no question of confining itself to a, quote,

580
00:36:37,040 --> 00:36:41,380
Speaker 2: timeless spiritual service. What exactly is that anyway? Mark's question.

581
00:36:42,180 --> 00:36:46,420
Speaker 2: There is a, quote, timeless religion, a timeless standard of morals.

582
00:36:48,080 --> 00:36:51,239
Speaker 2: The word of God, however, is never timeless. And that

583
00:36:51,260 --> 00:36:52,880
Speaker 2: could be a little bit scandalous, right, for him to

584
00:36:52,940 --> 00:36:54,550
Speaker 2: say that. He says the time in which we live

585
00:36:54,590 --> 00:36:58,070
Speaker 2: is the time accorded to us through God's patience between

586
00:36:58,110 --> 00:37:01,390
Speaker 2: the resurrection of Jesus and his second coming. Therefore, it

587
00:37:01,430 --> 00:37:02,110
Speaker 2: is God's time.

588
00:37:02,170 --> 00:37:02,250
Speaker 1: No.

589
00:37:03,320 --> 00:37:06,140
Speaker 2: I'll say as a side note, for anyone interested, then

590
00:37:06,160 --> 00:37:08,819
Speaker 2: go dig into his church dogmatics. I'm intrigued that he

591
00:37:08,860 --> 00:37:11,580
Speaker 2: says that here because he kind of sets up three

592
00:37:11,620 --> 00:37:15,500
Speaker 2: senses of time in his church dogmatics. The first one

593
00:37:15,540 --> 00:37:17,490
Speaker 2: is what we tend to think of as natural history,

594
00:37:17,550 --> 00:37:20,370
Speaker 2: and it's what historians are trying to get at, natural

595
00:37:20,410 --> 00:37:22,570
Speaker 2: scientists are trying to get at, physicists are trying to

596
00:37:22,610 --> 00:37:24,950
Speaker 2: get at when they date the universe according to red

597
00:37:24,969 --> 00:37:29,140
Speaker 2: and blue shifts in cosmic light. And he says that's

598
00:37:29,200 --> 00:37:31,620
Speaker 2: stuff that's all predicated upon our method in the present,

599
00:37:31,860 --> 00:37:33,700
Speaker 2: and that's what we tend to think of as history.

600
00:37:34,920 --> 00:37:38,380
Speaker 2: And comporting to that is what counts as history. But

601
00:37:38,400 --> 00:37:40,730
Speaker 2: then he says there's biblical time, and that's what he

602
00:37:40,770 --> 00:37:43,690
Speaker 2: describes here as God's time, and that's the narrative of

603
00:37:43,770 --> 00:37:48,930
Speaker 2: creation to consummation, new creation. But actually in his dogmatics,

604
00:37:48,969 --> 00:37:52,680
Speaker 2: he says the true time is what he calls Christological time,

605
00:37:52,739 --> 00:37:56,700
Speaker 2: and it's the time that's measured from from the cross

606
00:37:56,739 --> 00:37:59,400
Speaker 2: of Christ. So everything exists either on the shadow of

607
00:37:59,440 --> 00:38:01,520
Speaker 2: the cross on one side looking forward to it, or

608
00:38:01,560 --> 00:38:03,260
Speaker 2: in the shadow of the cross on the other side

609
00:38:03,880 --> 00:38:07,380
Speaker 2: with the unpacking of that reality. Now, I'm intrigued that

610
00:38:07,440 --> 00:38:10,190
Speaker 2: he has left that number three out and he's identified

611
00:38:10,210 --> 00:38:12,810
Speaker 2: the true time or God's time here with number two.

612
00:38:13,790 --> 00:38:15,870
Speaker 2: That's a nerd moment. But I think for our purposes,

613
00:38:15,910 --> 00:38:19,330
Speaker 2: what's significant is the way that he wants to describe

614
00:38:19,370 --> 00:38:24,020
Speaker 2: this cuts away from what we tend to want to believe,

615
00:38:24,080 --> 00:38:27,430
Speaker 2: as you've said, that There's a single timeless truth that

616
00:38:27,489 --> 00:38:30,630
Speaker 2: we've set up in the clouds, and that's what we

617
00:38:30,650 --> 00:38:33,870
Speaker 2: have to access as these eternal principles, and that's what

618
00:38:33,890 --> 00:38:35,569
Speaker 2: helps us make the decision in the moment to say,

619
00:38:35,730 --> 00:38:40,299
Speaker 2: this war is justified, or this political season requires this

620
00:38:40,420 --> 00:38:44,100
Speaker 2: kind of action, as opposed to that political season. But

621
00:38:44,140 --> 00:38:47,140
Speaker 2: what he wants to say against this idea of timeless

622
00:38:47,200 --> 00:38:49,239
Speaker 2: is that the word of God and the work of

623
00:38:49,280 --> 00:38:53,210
Speaker 2: reconciliation that the church participates in, by the grace of

624
00:38:53,250 --> 00:38:57,380
Speaker 2: God and his spirit, It means that every moment is

625
00:38:57,500 --> 00:39:00,360
Speaker 2: us trying to discern what it looks like to enact

626
00:39:00,440 --> 00:39:04,219
Speaker 2: that ministry of reconciliation in the present. So that, to

627
00:39:04,260 --> 00:39:07,950
Speaker 2: your point, had the allies lost, I want to take

628
00:39:07,969 --> 00:39:09,629
Speaker 2: you a step further and say I don't think Barth

629
00:39:09,650 --> 00:39:12,149
Speaker 2: would say, well, at least we did the right thing

630
00:39:12,190 --> 00:39:14,010
Speaker 2: and now we have to adjust to this new reality.

631
00:39:14,090 --> 00:39:17,130
Speaker 2: I think for him it's the nation state might have failed,

632
00:39:17,530 --> 00:39:20,250
Speaker 2: the allies might have failed, but the mission of the

633
00:39:20,290 --> 00:39:23,230
Speaker 2: church remains unchanged because it's now trying to discern in

634
00:39:23,370 --> 00:39:27,940
Speaker 2: this time where there's no longer that particular lever to

635
00:39:28,000 --> 00:39:29,950
Speaker 2: pull to resist Hitler.

636
00:39:30,530 --> 00:39:31,009
Speaker 1: How does the.

637
00:39:30,969 --> 00:39:34,910
Speaker 2: Church continue to act in a manner appropriate with participating

638
00:39:34,950 --> 00:39:39,800
Speaker 2: in the triune mission of reconciliation? Now what that looks

639
00:39:39,840 --> 00:39:43,500
Speaker 2: like might require looking to churches around the world who

640
00:39:43,980 --> 00:39:46,600
Speaker 2: have not lived under the condition of being able to

641
00:39:46,660 --> 00:39:52,319
Speaker 2: pull levers of power. It could mean looking at the

642
00:39:52,340 --> 00:39:55,370
Speaker 2: church under ISIS occupation and what that's looked like. It

643
00:39:55,390 --> 00:39:58,290
Speaker 2: might look like or look at churches in places like

644
00:39:58,350 --> 00:40:00,529
Speaker 2: China or India or Japan that have never had a

645
00:40:00,730 --> 00:40:07,910
Speaker 2: Christian political presence. It might mean looking to the so-called

646
00:40:07,950 --> 00:40:11,700
Speaker 2: liberation approaches that are in Latin America that have more

647
00:40:11,739 --> 00:40:15,220
Speaker 2: or less relationship to political power. But I think Barth's

648
00:40:15,280 --> 00:40:17,320
Speaker 2: point in this at the time was to say regardless

649
00:40:17,360 --> 00:40:18,860
Speaker 2: of what it looks like and who we have as

650
00:40:18,880 --> 00:40:23,910
Speaker 2: a model, The Church's mission is precisely timed in that

651
00:40:23,950 --> 00:40:27,779
Speaker 2: it's a discernment within places with what's available to us

652
00:40:27,980 --> 00:40:33,320
Speaker 2: to make the appropriate choice to participate in the ministry

653
00:40:33,340 --> 00:40:37,680
Speaker 2: of reconciliation, which means standing up to evil. And in

654
00:40:37,700 --> 00:40:40,100
Speaker 2: the moment of the Nazi regime, it meant these countries

655
00:40:40,340 --> 00:40:43,110
Speaker 2: and the Church to support the standing up against Hitler,

656
00:40:43,239 --> 00:40:45,650
Speaker 2: but not to be limited in its scope as if

657
00:40:45,710 --> 00:40:50,150
Speaker 2: the fullness of its of its witness of its reconciliation ministry.

658
00:40:50,170 --> 00:40:53,029
Speaker 2: It was tied up in the military actions. That's how

659
00:40:53,070 --> 00:40:53,710
Speaker 2: I read him here.

660
00:40:55,730 --> 00:40:58,549
Speaker 1: I agree. I think there's a, and this is always

661
00:40:58,610 --> 00:41:00,109
Speaker 1: one of those things that I kind of go back

662
00:41:00,170 --> 00:41:02,530
Speaker 1: and forth in my mind when we're talking about time

663
00:41:02,570 --> 00:41:04,629
Speaker 1: and the way that Bart is talking about it here,

664
00:41:05,190 --> 00:41:08,650
Speaker 1: it always feels like time and space collapse. Like there's

665
00:41:08,690 --> 00:41:11,730
Speaker 1: a dislocation that I think he's talking about and trying

666
00:41:11,770 --> 00:41:16,189
Speaker 1: to avoid here. Don't dislocate yourself. You're always located. You're

667
00:41:16,230 --> 00:41:19,630
Speaker 1: always in, in the place where you are and you

668
00:41:19,690 --> 00:41:22,730
Speaker 1: can't sort of, he even talks about it a little bit,

669
00:41:22,770 --> 00:41:25,609
Speaker 1: you know, like don't, don't pull out and talk about

670
00:41:26,070 --> 00:41:30,640
Speaker 1: this vacuum of timelessness, right? Don't, don't pull away from

671
00:41:30,680 --> 00:41:33,820
Speaker 1: the context, embed yourself within the context. And so I

672
00:41:33,840 --> 00:41:37,279
Speaker 1: think the way you described it is really helpful. It's

673
00:41:38,460 --> 00:41:41,200
Speaker 1: I think that element of what we're looking at here

674
00:41:41,480 --> 00:41:47,700
Speaker 1: is number one, really difficult for anyone to handle. I

675
00:41:47,739 --> 00:41:53,279
Speaker 1: think it's very hard to recognize that there's a stability

676
00:41:53,360 --> 00:41:57,319
Speaker 1: in our convictions and our beliefs and who we are

677
00:41:57,380 --> 00:42:01,250
Speaker 1: as the church that maintains across time. And that what

678
00:42:01,270 --> 00:42:06,130
Speaker 1: we're always doing is renegotiating how to execute that faithfully

679
00:42:06,170 --> 00:42:10,149
Speaker 1: in any given moment. Because even though we have this

680
00:42:10,210 --> 00:42:13,930
Speaker 1: sort of stability in who we are in Christ and

681
00:42:14,010 --> 00:42:17,359
Speaker 1: what the church is and what our mission is, what

682
00:42:17,390 --> 00:42:22,580
Speaker 1: our convictions are, we want more stability on the day-to-day

683
00:42:22,640 --> 00:42:27,900
Speaker 1: level than I think often we get. And so we

684
00:42:28,000 --> 00:42:31,400
Speaker 1: end up sort of vacillating on some of these issues

685
00:42:31,500 --> 00:42:35,600
Speaker 1: as opposed to really rethinking what does it mean for

686
00:42:35,739 --> 00:42:40,009
Speaker 1: us to offer a faithful witness in this moment? period. And,

687
00:42:40,230 --> 00:42:42,850
Speaker 1: and if we started there, if we said, you know,

688
00:42:42,870 --> 00:42:45,310
Speaker 1: what does it look like for this next decision that

689
00:42:45,370 --> 00:42:49,700
Speaker 1: I make to point other people to, uh, or to,

690
00:42:50,410 --> 00:42:53,640
Speaker 1: to point to and glorify God, what would it mean

691
00:42:53,680 --> 00:42:56,340
Speaker 1: for that next decision to look like that? That's a

692
00:42:56,380 --> 00:42:59,380
Speaker 1: whole different decision matrix that we, that we would, than

693
00:42:59,400 --> 00:43:04,460
Speaker 1: we normally employ. We're not thinking now, beginning with sort

694
00:43:04,480 --> 00:43:07,420
Speaker 1: of a rational response where we sit back and say, okay,

695
00:43:07,480 --> 00:43:10,080
Speaker 1: what do we think this would lead to cause and

696
00:43:10,120 --> 00:43:12,500
Speaker 1: effect wise? What do we think? Would this be an

697
00:43:12,560 --> 00:43:16,100
Speaker 1: effective decision? Would this be an efficient decision? The first

698
00:43:16,140 --> 00:43:18,980
Speaker 1: decision for the church is, is this going to point

699
00:43:19,020 --> 00:43:23,140
Speaker 1: to and glorify God? And if it won't, these other

700
00:43:23,239 --> 00:43:26,170
Speaker 1: options are off the table. I think that's what Bart's

701
00:43:26,190 --> 00:43:28,490
Speaker 1: trying to underscore. And that's what I hear you saying.

702
00:43:28,550 --> 00:43:32,900
Speaker 1: It's just in different words, I suppose. Right.

703
00:43:32,960 --> 00:43:35,220
Speaker 2: I mean, who can repeat the exact words of Barth,

704
00:43:35,860 --> 00:43:41,230
Speaker 2: but Barth himself. But it's worth noting that for Barth,

705
00:43:43,090 --> 00:43:48,270
Speaker 2: everything boils down to the ministry of Jesus as the

706
00:43:48,330 --> 00:43:52,860
Speaker 2: incarnate word. And Jesus is the one who fully unveils

707
00:43:52,940 --> 00:43:57,060
Speaker 2: or fully reveals the persons of the triune God in

708
00:43:57,100 --> 00:44:01,160
Speaker 2: his march to and death upon the cross. And then

709
00:44:01,200 --> 00:44:04,800
Speaker 2: out of that, the resurrection. So if we take away that,

710
00:44:04,920 --> 00:44:10,630
Speaker 2: we've lost the litmus test for understanding God's time. Because

711
00:44:10,710 --> 00:44:14,150
Speaker 2: all of God's time becomes meaningful in that moment. So

712
00:44:14,190 --> 00:44:17,250
Speaker 2: it's precisely the case that one might have to suffer.

713
00:44:17,410 --> 00:44:19,690
Speaker 2: In fact, we should expect that one might have to

714
00:44:19,730 --> 00:44:22,210
Speaker 2: suffer for that purpose. And I think that's important because

715
00:44:22,250 --> 00:44:26,660
Speaker 2: I think often I hear Christians hearing disagreement as suffering

716
00:44:27,980 --> 00:44:32,380
Speaker 2: or hearing attempts to grab control being rebuffed as therefore suffering.

717
00:44:33,310 --> 00:44:36,529
Speaker 2: And that's not what Barth's getting at here. For him,

718
00:44:36,570 --> 00:44:39,670
Speaker 2: it's about a participation. So he says, woe betide if

719
00:44:39,730 --> 00:44:43,670
Speaker 2: the church should desecrate itself in this cause instead of

720
00:44:43,770 --> 00:44:47,230
Speaker 2: seeing to it, on the contrary, that this cause be

721
00:44:47,290 --> 00:44:50,750
Speaker 2: consecrated through the church, this cause being the resistance against

722
00:44:51,870 --> 00:44:57,570
Speaker 2: Nazis and Hitler. So that this cause is consecrated through

723
00:44:57,590 --> 00:45:00,850
Speaker 2: the church, that the righteousness and necessity of this war

724
00:45:00,910 --> 00:45:03,800
Speaker 2: for the defense of the righteous state be preserved to

725
00:45:03,860 --> 00:45:07,739
Speaker 2: the nations, to their governments and armies consciously, thus giving

726
00:45:07,780 --> 00:45:10,450
Speaker 2: them a clear conscience in the conduct of it, but

727
00:45:10,510 --> 00:45:15,610
Speaker 2: also preserving the moderation necessary to its proper conclusion. This mission,

728
00:45:15,690 --> 00:45:18,070
Speaker 2: by virtue of which it preaches a righteous peace in

729
00:45:18,090 --> 00:45:21,009
Speaker 2: the midst of war, and thus approves the war only

730
00:45:21,070 --> 00:45:24,359
Speaker 2: for the sake of righteous peace, but for its sake

731
00:45:24,680 --> 00:45:27,600
Speaker 2: does so in wholehearted earnest, is the prophetic mission of

732
00:45:27,620 --> 00:45:33,860
Speaker 2: the Church in this war. I think that's telling. Because again,

733
00:45:33,950 --> 00:45:38,080
Speaker 2: he's making sure that the church understands it's not that

734
00:45:38,120 --> 00:45:42,540
Speaker 2: we're joining in for some righteous purpose that the state

735
00:45:42,580 --> 00:45:47,240
Speaker 2: already has, but it's that in this moment, the church,

736
00:45:47,460 --> 00:45:50,410
Speaker 2: like in every moment, needs to be attentive to what

737
00:45:50,450 --> 00:45:54,670
Speaker 2: it means to stand up against the powers and principalities,

738
00:45:54,730 --> 00:45:58,549
Speaker 2: to use Paul's language. And within standing up to the

739
00:45:58,590 --> 00:46:03,190
Speaker 2: powers and principalities, to do so in a political climate

740
00:46:03,310 --> 00:46:07,600
Speaker 2: in which it's possible for the state as a local entity,

741
00:46:07,680 --> 00:46:11,319
Speaker 2: as a nation state, to join in for whatever their

742
00:46:11,340 --> 00:46:14,480
Speaker 2: purposes are to the same task, but to continue to

743
00:46:14,540 --> 00:46:19,189
Speaker 2: recognize that the church's purposes are different. And that again

744
00:46:19,250 --> 00:46:22,510
Speaker 2: gets them to the same conclusion, that should the state fail,

745
00:46:22,690 --> 00:46:26,230
Speaker 2: the church's mission has not changed, even if its mechanism

746
00:46:26,270 --> 00:46:30,730
Speaker 2: of achieving it might be changed by the levers it

747
00:46:30,770 --> 00:46:31,250
Speaker 2: has to pull.

748
00:46:31,270 --> 00:46:36,230
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think this last section of his letter,

749
00:46:36,890 --> 00:46:40,530
Speaker 1: section five, really underscores everything we've kind of been saying here,

750
00:46:40,700 --> 00:46:44,040
Speaker 1: because he gets to this point where he asks the question,

751
00:46:44,239 --> 00:46:46,899
Speaker 1: you know, is the church at war? And basically says, no,

752
00:46:46,980 --> 00:46:49,899
Speaker 1: it's not, if in the sense of the church being

753
00:46:49,980 --> 00:46:53,200
Speaker 1: at war, we mean that it's an instrument of the state.

754
00:46:54,260 --> 00:46:57,830
Speaker 1: And he justifies this by saying that It can't be

755
00:46:57,870 --> 00:47:00,450
Speaker 1: an instrument of the state because whether we're at war

756
00:47:00,530 --> 00:47:03,819
Speaker 1: or at peace, the church belongs to the Lord. And

757
00:47:03,880 --> 00:47:06,339
Speaker 1: it's taking its marching orders from him. And so he says,

758
00:47:06,380 --> 00:47:08,799
Speaker 1: you know, in war as in peace, it serves its

759
00:47:08,900 --> 00:47:12,020
Speaker 1: own Lord. The church serves its own Lord, pursues its

760
00:47:12,160 --> 00:47:16,420
Speaker 1: own cause and speaks its own language. The cause and

761
00:47:16,440 --> 00:47:18,520
Speaker 1: message of the gospel, which is directed to friend and

762
00:47:18,540 --> 00:47:21,080
Speaker 1: foe alike, is not dependent on the outcome of the war,

763
00:47:21,239 --> 00:47:24,660
Speaker 1: whatever it may be. And I think here we have

764
00:47:24,719 --> 00:47:29,180
Speaker 1: that sort of return to Barth's original question that he posed, right?

765
00:47:29,219 --> 00:47:32,660
Speaker 1: Because you have the Lord owning the church. The church

766
00:47:32,700 --> 00:47:37,890
Speaker 1: is answerable to a different authority than the nation state.

767
00:47:38,210 --> 00:47:41,230
Speaker 1: And it's not taking its marching orders from the nation state. Again,

768
00:47:41,670 --> 00:47:43,750
Speaker 1: it's hard not to hear sort of echoes of the

769
00:47:43,790 --> 00:47:48,969
Speaker 1: Barman Declaration in this. Because in the Barman Declaration, he

770
00:47:49,110 --> 00:47:52,790
Speaker 1: very much scopes this out in a very similar way.

771
00:47:53,560 --> 00:47:55,360
Speaker 1: And I think that this is sort of at the

772
00:47:55,460 --> 00:47:58,230
Speaker 1: heart of how Bart is reasoning through this whole thing,

773
00:47:59,010 --> 00:48:02,050
Speaker 1: that the church is not at war in the sense

774
00:48:02,110 --> 00:48:05,190
Speaker 1: that it is serving the state, but the church may

775
00:48:05,230 --> 00:48:08,989
Speaker 1: very well be at war in the sense that it's

776
00:48:09,489 --> 00:48:14,120
Speaker 1: fighting to continue its mission faithfully in the midst of

777
00:48:14,219 --> 00:48:17,580
Speaker 1: hostile powers and pressures that are trying to get it

778
00:48:17,620 --> 00:48:22,529
Speaker 1: to compromise that mission. Right. Part of the fight then

779
00:48:22,570 --> 00:48:26,549
Speaker 1: of the church becomes making sure that we're continuing to

780
00:48:26,590 --> 00:48:29,230
Speaker 1: pursue our own cause, making sure that we're continuing to

781
00:48:29,290 --> 00:48:32,819
Speaker 1: speak our own language. These are the things that I

782
00:48:33,160 --> 00:48:36,660
Speaker 1: think Bart would say, yeah, these are the things that

783
00:48:36,700 --> 00:48:40,120
Speaker 1: we should never give up. These are part of what

784
00:48:40,160 --> 00:48:42,540
Speaker 1: are constitutive of what it means to be the church.

785
00:48:43,180 --> 00:48:46,649
Speaker 1: And if we lose these things, we do in some

786
00:48:46,690 --> 00:48:51,260
Speaker 1: sense lose our war. And that's not World War II.

787
00:48:51,320 --> 00:48:56,320
Speaker 1: That's not World War I. It's this fight against, you mentioned,

788
00:48:56,340 --> 00:49:00,500
Speaker 1: the principalities and powers that try to suck us into

789
00:49:00,560 --> 00:49:03,700
Speaker 1: a world that we're really not part of and that

790
00:49:03,739 --> 00:49:08,779
Speaker 1: try to get us to live on terms that it defines.

791
00:49:10,420 --> 00:49:13,640
Speaker 1: I like to say the world always tries to get

792
00:49:13,719 --> 00:49:16,410
Speaker 1: us to love it on its own terms. but the

793
00:49:16,450 --> 00:49:18,969
Speaker 1: church's job is to love the world on God's terms.

794
00:49:19,800 --> 00:49:22,980
Speaker 1: And so we're constantly, that's the battle we're fighting. That's

795
00:49:23,060 --> 00:49:27,720
Speaker 1: the moment of resistance that we're trying to execute well

796
00:49:28,280 --> 00:49:31,020
Speaker 1: is making sure that we're loving the world on God's terms.

797
00:49:31,920 --> 00:49:34,660
Speaker 1: And I think this last section in Bart's letter really

798
00:49:34,760 --> 00:49:41,060
Speaker 1: underscores his whole vision of for how he thinks these

799
00:49:41,140 --> 00:49:45,620
Speaker 1: things through and it begins very much with the church

800
00:49:45,680 --> 00:49:47,890
Speaker 1: is not its own it belongs to the lord and

801
00:49:47,910 --> 00:49:52,330
Speaker 1: the lord only and thus anything it does and says

802
00:49:52,630 --> 00:49:54,529
Speaker 1: has to conform to the image of.

803
00:49:54,510 --> 00:49:59,529
Speaker 2: Christ yeah so i think i think one of the

804
00:49:59,570 --> 00:50:03,740
Speaker 2: key phrases there is the terms the terms of engagement

805
00:50:04,760 --> 00:50:06,800
Speaker 2: so even to the degree that they have a similar

806
00:50:06,840 --> 00:50:13,060
Speaker 2: pursuit the church doesn't have a military, the true sense

807
00:50:13,080 --> 00:50:16,430
Speaker 2: of the military. So the idea of resistance doesn't even

808
00:50:16,450 --> 00:50:20,290
Speaker 2: necessarily look the same. What exactly it looks like when

809
00:50:20,370 --> 00:50:23,670
Speaker 2: the purposes of the church are to resist and the

810
00:50:23,810 --> 00:50:28,070
Speaker 2: allies are allied with them enables a certain kind of

811
00:50:28,090 --> 00:50:31,420
Speaker 2: resistance in this regime. But if we pull out of

812
00:50:31,460 --> 00:50:35,060
Speaker 2: that setting and we come to the present time, it

813
00:50:35,080 --> 00:50:37,720
Speaker 2: can be very easy for the church's rhetoric. You use

814
00:50:37,840 --> 00:50:39,690
Speaker 2: the You used the issue of language, which I think

815
00:50:39,770 --> 00:50:43,540
Speaker 2: is an important one. For the church's language to start

816
00:50:43,580 --> 00:50:47,620
Speaker 2: to sound like the language of a political party. And

817
00:50:47,660 --> 00:50:50,240
Speaker 2: that should be a moment of pause to ask the question,

818
00:50:51,600 --> 00:50:56,410
Speaker 2: whose cause is this? Now note that that doesn't mean

819
00:50:56,469 --> 00:51:01,010
Speaker 2: that a particular political party doesn't have an agenda item

820
00:51:01,810 --> 00:51:05,670
Speaker 2: that overlaps with what the church should stand for. That's

821
00:51:05,690 --> 00:51:10,339
Speaker 2: entirely plausible. But that's not what's at issue here. What's

822
00:51:10,400 --> 00:51:13,360
Speaker 2: at issue here is when the language of the church

823
00:51:15,020 --> 00:51:18,460
Speaker 2: is reduced to the language of a party. Or the

824
00:51:18,520 --> 00:51:24,270
Speaker 2: language of the church begins to be formed by the

825
00:51:24,310 --> 00:51:28,149
Speaker 2: talking points of a party. And that could be their party.

826
00:51:28,170 --> 00:51:31,550
Speaker 2: Of course, we know that one is more dominantly tapped

827
00:51:31,590 --> 00:51:35,660
Speaker 2: into the church, but it's not restrictive to just that party.

828
00:51:37,540 --> 00:51:39,820
Speaker 2: The church should be asking itself in that moment, have

829
00:51:39,840 --> 00:51:44,160
Speaker 2: the things that I have to stand for, the things

830
00:51:44,219 --> 00:51:50,150
Speaker 2: that characterize the ministry of Christ, been reduced now to

831
00:51:50,770 --> 00:51:54,890
Speaker 2: the party that has co-opted it as a cog within

832
00:51:54,969 --> 00:52:01,399
Speaker 2: its agenda? And if so, that should be a problem. Again,

833
00:52:01,440 --> 00:52:03,320
Speaker 2: that doesn't mean throw the baby out with the bathwater.

834
00:52:05,719 --> 00:52:08,859
Speaker 2: There might be particular issues to continue to stand for,

835
00:52:08,910 --> 00:52:11,649
Speaker 2: but the language has to be adjusted so that that

836
00:52:11,710 --> 00:52:15,850
Speaker 2: becomes part of a larger rhetoric. And that larger rhetoric

837
00:52:15,930 --> 00:52:20,810
Speaker 2: is holistic, right? So perhaps the issue is a respect

838
00:52:20,870 --> 00:52:23,850
Speaker 2: for life. It needs to be a respect for life

839
00:52:23,890 --> 00:52:30,509
Speaker 2: that's rooted in the notion of people as created image

840
00:52:30,550 --> 00:52:34,660
Speaker 2: bearers before a God who cares about life from beginning

841
00:52:34,700 --> 00:52:38,839
Speaker 2: to end. but also the same God who also cares

842
00:52:38,880 --> 00:52:43,630
Speaker 2: about the life that the image barriers are embedded within.

843
00:52:45,450 --> 00:52:48,330
Speaker 2: There's life all around us. And the Creator is their

844
00:52:48,370 --> 00:52:50,529
Speaker 2: Creator as well, or its Creator as well, however you

845
00:52:50,550 --> 00:52:52,910
Speaker 2: want to put it. And all of the things in

846
00:52:52,930 --> 00:52:57,070
Speaker 2: the ways that we're created are implicated within our very bodies.

847
00:52:57,570 --> 00:53:00,080
Speaker 2: As I often get my students to chuckle at, all

848
00:53:00,100 --> 00:53:02,040
Speaker 2: of our mothers are glad that we weren't born the

849
00:53:02,080 --> 00:53:05,900
Speaker 2: sizes that we are now. But what led into us

850
00:53:05,940 --> 00:53:08,120
Speaker 2: getting this size? It's the fact that we are deeply

851
00:53:08,180 --> 00:53:11,890
Speaker 2: entangled with a larger creative environment that we do need

852
00:53:11,930 --> 00:53:16,830
Speaker 2: to be protective against, not least because our personal survival

853
00:53:16,850 --> 00:53:20,770
Speaker 2: depends on it, but also because the very beginning of

854
00:53:20,810 --> 00:53:24,860
Speaker 2: the creative order, as marked out by God, entailed giving

855
00:53:24,960 --> 00:53:27,299
Speaker 2: us to the rest of creation to care for it,

856
00:53:28,580 --> 00:53:30,940
Speaker 2: to have a kind of mastery over it that wasn't

857
00:53:31,820 --> 00:53:34,790
Speaker 2: forceful control, but was rather a kind of mastery that

858
00:53:34,830 --> 00:53:40,870
Speaker 2: was artistic. It's to understand deeply what a thing or

859
00:53:40,890 --> 00:53:43,649
Speaker 2: a set of things needs to be able to work

860
00:53:43,690 --> 00:53:47,390
Speaker 2: from within that. Now we're talking about a language and

861
00:53:47,410 --> 00:53:50,529
Speaker 2: a rhetoric that belongs to the church as shaped by

862
00:53:51,280 --> 00:53:54,220
Speaker 2: the time that Bart Schmidt was saying is God's time,

863
00:53:54,580 --> 00:53:58,560
Speaker 2: the narrative of creation to new creation, and recognizing within

864
00:53:58,580 --> 00:54:01,799
Speaker 2: that where we stand, that we live somewhere between the

865
00:54:01,840 --> 00:54:05,879
Speaker 2: cross and the shadow it lays upon creation in anticipation

866
00:54:05,920 --> 00:54:09,319
Speaker 2: of the consummation. That's a different rhetoric, and I think

867
00:54:09,340 --> 00:54:12,279
Speaker 2: that's really important to what Barth is trying to get

868
00:54:12,320 --> 00:54:16,410
Speaker 2: at here to draw this distinction. And if one wants

869
00:54:16,450 --> 00:54:18,299
Speaker 2: to push back, I'll at least say it's important for

870
00:54:18,340 --> 00:54:21,680
Speaker 2: me to be able to articulate what I think is

871
00:54:21,719 --> 00:54:25,589
Speaker 2: that same spirit in the present and how that has

872
00:54:25,630 --> 00:54:30,890
Speaker 2: to be something that directs the church, not particular sloganeering

873
00:54:31,660 --> 00:54:35,759
Speaker 2: that one party is used to co-opt us, one or

874
00:54:35,780 --> 00:54:36,320
Speaker 2: the other party.

875
00:54:37,200 --> 00:54:42,750
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah. I think going back to that issue of

876
00:54:42,830 --> 00:54:46,590
Speaker 1: language and how it influences the way that we think,

877
00:54:47,370 --> 00:54:50,029
Speaker 1: there was a fascinating TED talk, and I'm forgetting the

878
00:54:50,070 --> 00:54:53,550
Speaker 1: doctor's name, but she talks about a tribe in Africa

879
00:54:53,590 --> 00:54:57,400
Speaker 1: that uses the cardinal directions instead of right and left.

880
00:54:58,840 --> 00:55:01,759
Speaker 1: And so, you know, at any given moment, you're You

881
00:55:01,780 --> 00:55:04,340
Speaker 1: may have a north hand and a south hand. You

882
00:55:04,380 --> 00:55:07,360
Speaker 1: might have an east hand and a west hand. And

883
00:55:07,390 --> 00:55:11,830
Speaker 1: they might switch depending on which direction you're facing. When

884
00:55:11,870 --> 00:55:16,489
Speaker 1: we think about how that way of using language would

885
00:55:16,610 --> 00:55:20,169
Speaker 1: reshape our understanding of the world. I mean, I couldn't

886
00:55:20,210 --> 00:55:22,170
Speaker 1: tell you what direction I'm facing right now if you

887
00:55:22,190 --> 00:55:26,370
Speaker 1: paid me. I have no idea whether I'm facing north, south, east,

888
00:55:26,410 --> 00:55:30,739
Speaker 1: or west. Yeah, I have no clue. But But if

889
00:55:30,760 --> 00:55:34,140
Speaker 1: you grow up in an environment where those cardinal directions

890
00:55:34,200 --> 00:55:40,000
Speaker 1: are so crucial because they're governing everyday activities, that language

891
00:55:40,080 --> 00:55:42,219
Speaker 1: now starts to shape the way you perceive the world

892
00:55:42,280 --> 00:55:46,560
Speaker 1: around you. These directions, north, south, east, and west, become

893
00:55:46,660 --> 00:55:49,719
Speaker 1: far more significant than right or left, which are ingrained

894
00:55:49,780 --> 00:55:55,230
Speaker 1: in our understanding of directionality. Far more, I would argue,

895
00:55:55,250 --> 00:55:58,140
Speaker 1: than north, south, east, and west. And so I think

896
00:55:58,180 --> 00:56:00,919
Speaker 1: that these issues of language, if we take that sort

897
00:56:00,940 --> 00:56:04,090
Speaker 1: of analogy and we say, okay, then why is Barth

898
00:56:04,110 --> 00:56:07,370
Speaker 1: so keen on theological language? And why is it that

899
00:56:07,770 --> 00:56:10,230
Speaker 1: we need to make sure that we're not adopting the

900
00:56:10,290 --> 00:56:13,670
Speaker 1: language of any given political party, even if we share

901
00:56:15,469 --> 00:56:20,960
Speaker 1: some sort of, even if we agree with some of

902
00:56:20,980 --> 00:56:24,180
Speaker 1: the concerns of that political party? And I think in

903
00:56:24,239 --> 00:56:28,200
Speaker 1: large part, it's because the language we use begins to

904
00:56:28,260 --> 00:56:34,440
Speaker 1: shape our imagination. And so using these theological terms, rooting

905
00:56:34,500 --> 00:56:37,799
Speaker 1: ourselves back in, being careful about how we articulate this

906
00:56:38,200 --> 00:56:41,020
Speaker 1: theological precision that we've seen Barth use at various points

907
00:56:41,060 --> 00:56:46,230
Speaker 1: in the letter, is not him being esoteric. It's him

908
00:56:46,310 --> 00:56:49,940
Speaker 1: trying to be thoroughly theological and rooting the church back

909
00:56:50,000 --> 00:56:53,120
Speaker 1: into itself. And I think that we need to get

910
00:56:53,180 --> 00:56:56,700
Speaker 1: our heads around that because the way we use language

911
00:56:56,800 --> 00:57:00,259
Speaker 1: actually does matter. And if we go around talking as

912
00:57:00,340 --> 00:57:05,089
Speaker 1: if we're all Republicans or all Democrats, I just had

913
00:57:05,130 --> 00:57:09,830
Speaker 1: an interview with a gentleman who said that he'd had

914
00:57:09,870 --> 00:57:12,770
Speaker 1: an issue in his church where someone was listening to

915
00:57:12,810 --> 00:57:16,090
Speaker 1: a podcaster who said, you know, if your pastor says

916
00:57:16,130 --> 00:57:18,750
Speaker 1: the word justice from the pulpit, you should just leave.

917
00:57:20,760 --> 00:57:24,240
Speaker 1: And his comment was, how much of the Old Testament

918
00:57:24,280 --> 00:57:29,820
Speaker 1: do you want me to skip? Like, it's a biblical word.

919
00:57:30,460 --> 00:57:34,350
Speaker 1: But these are the things that if we start allowing

920
00:57:34,610 --> 00:57:38,310
Speaker 1: the political rhetoric to shape the way we talk, to

921
00:57:38,350 --> 00:57:42,730
Speaker 1: shape the way our language works, to shape our understanding

922
00:57:42,770 --> 00:57:47,180
Speaker 1: of these deeply biblical terms, we are going to lose

923
00:57:47,280 --> 00:57:51,040
Speaker 1: more than just language. We're going to start loosening our

924
00:57:51,060 --> 00:57:53,520
Speaker 1: grip on reality. We're going to start losing our identity,

925
00:57:53,640 --> 00:57:56,760
Speaker 1: and we're going to stop being able to affirm the good,

926
00:57:56,780 --> 00:57:58,630
Speaker 1: the true, and the beautiful that we see before us

927
00:57:58,730 --> 00:58:01,250
Speaker 1: while also pointing beyond it to the triune God who

928
00:58:01,290 --> 00:58:05,710
Speaker 1: is its source. And I think that's basically one of

929
00:58:05,750 --> 00:58:08,970
Speaker 1: the basic missions of the church needs to be Look,

930
00:58:09,010 --> 00:58:12,110
Speaker 1: we're not saying that the world is completely and totally

931
00:58:12,290 --> 00:58:16,120
Speaker 1: off base on everything. You know, there's a righteous state.

932
00:58:16,800 --> 00:58:20,020
Speaker 1: And as Bart is arguing in his letter, nation states

933
00:58:20,060 --> 00:58:23,820
Speaker 1: can do good things. So it's not like they're evil

934
00:58:23,920 --> 00:58:26,600
Speaker 1: and we need to just jettison them completely. We need

935
00:58:26,640 --> 00:58:28,860
Speaker 1: to recognize when they're doing good things, just as we

936
00:58:28,900 --> 00:58:32,550
Speaker 1: recognize when they're doing bad things. But in either case,

937
00:58:32,710 --> 00:58:35,290
Speaker 1: we need to be pointing them not just to some

938
00:58:35,350 --> 00:58:38,900
Speaker 1: sort of vague moral standard. What we need to be

939
00:58:38,960 --> 00:58:43,070
Speaker 1: reminding them is that the authority that owns the church,

940
00:58:43,430 --> 00:58:47,890
Speaker 1: the God who owns the church, he is the authority

941
00:58:47,950 --> 00:58:52,210
Speaker 1: over all things, not just over the church. And so

942
00:58:52,270 --> 00:58:56,210
Speaker 1: we've got to be pointing these nations to that God

943
00:58:56,310 --> 00:58:59,030
Speaker 1: who is going to judge, that God who has authority

944
00:58:59,170 --> 00:59:03,640
Speaker 1: over them, to the God who establishes reality. And if

945
00:59:03,700 --> 00:59:07,290
Speaker 1: we're not, we're not doing our job. And I think

946
00:59:07,330 --> 00:59:10,200
Speaker 1: that's just a crucial aspect of all of this. that

947
00:59:10,440 --> 00:59:14,300
Speaker 1: Bart's emphasis on language. I noticed it when I was

948
00:59:14,340 --> 00:59:16,600
Speaker 1: reading through his church dogmatics, like back in the day.

949
00:59:17,180 --> 00:59:19,450
Speaker 1: But I mean, here, I think it comes out so

950
00:59:19,770 --> 00:59:25,770
Speaker 1: well and so clearly that to be the church, we

951
00:59:25,810 --> 00:59:30,110
Speaker 1: have to speak the language of the church. And in

952
00:59:30,190 --> 00:59:33,169
Speaker 1: speaking the language of the church, we're signaling that we're

953
00:59:33,210 --> 00:59:36,030
Speaker 1: living life on God's terms, not on the terms of

954
00:59:36,050 --> 00:59:36,350
Speaker 1: the world.

955
00:59:37,930 --> 00:59:40,310
Speaker 2: And to be clear, you and Bart are not saying

956
00:59:40,430 --> 00:59:42,940
Speaker 2: we invent our own languages so that no one understands us.

957
00:59:43,720 --> 00:59:44,800
Speaker 1: No, no Klingon.

958
00:59:45,640 --> 00:59:49,560
Speaker 2: Correct, correct. But the issue at play, I've said that

959
00:59:49,600 --> 00:59:56,220
Speaker 2: a lot this episode, it's an important one, is sort

960
00:59:56,260 --> 00:59:59,320
Speaker 2: of akin to Norman Worsba has a book where he's advocating,

961
01:00:00,840 --> 01:00:04,900
Speaker 2: speaking of creation rather than nature. Not because he sees

962
01:00:05,720 --> 01:00:08,310
Speaker 2: nature as a four-letter word, but because what he's really

963
01:00:08,370 --> 01:00:11,950
Speaker 2: trying to do is to emphasize that when we're talking

964
01:00:11,990 --> 01:00:14,870
Speaker 2: about the rest of the things around us that include us,

965
01:00:16,810 --> 01:00:20,880
Speaker 2: we are making an explicit linguistic connection to God in

966
01:00:20,900 --> 01:00:24,340
Speaker 2: the moment. That it's not just the tree out there.

967
01:00:24,500 --> 01:00:27,980
Speaker 2: It's not just my body, your body. It's not just

968
01:00:28,060 --> 01:00:32,320
Speaker 2: the dog. but all of us are the work, the

969
01:00:32,360 --> 01:00:36,680
Speaker 2: handiwork of a God who created. And that places us,

970
01:00:37,490 --> 01:00:40,570
Speaker 2: again to the Bart point, within a timeline, or if

971
01:00:40,590 --> 01:00:45,250
Speaker 2: you prefer, a story. And that story is one that

972
01:00:45,370 --> 01:00:50,150
Speaker 2: sees us between creation and new creation. And more specifically

973
01:00:50,190 --> 01:00:55,490
Speaker 2: in our moment, between the cross and new creation. And

974
01:00:55,590 --> 01:00:58,830
Speaker 2: that's what I think Bart's getting at. That's where the

975
01:00:58,910 --> 01:01:03,040
Speaker 2: saltiness of the church comes in being deliberate with language,

976
01:01:03,720 --> 01:01:09,200
Speaker 2: even poetic with language. Sometimes poetry can seem too opaque,

977
01:01:10,540 --> 01:01:13,030
Speaker 2: but there's a kind of prose that can be poetic,

978
01:01:13,160 --> 01:01:17,050
Speaker 2: as Owen Barfield talks about, that enables us to take

979
01:01:17,110 --> 01:01:21,830
Speaker 2: something and signal to something bigger. And that's the call,

980
01:01:21,870 --> 01:01:24,350
Speaker 2: maybe on the little level, to say creation instead of nature.

981
01:01:24,630 --> 01:01:26,450
Speaker 2: But it's also a call to say we won't just

982
01:01:26,530 --> 01:01:30,130
Speaker 2: simply repeat the talking points that a group of people

983
01:01:30,230 --> 01:01:38,070
Speaker 2: want us to consolidate their political power base. Our goal

984
01:01:38,130 --> 01:01:41,800
Speaker 2: here is to testify to the work of reconciliation that

985
01:01:41,880 --> 01:01:44,480
Speaker 2: might include some of those talking points, but never on

986
01:01:44,520 --> 01:01:48,720
Speaker 2: their linguistic terms. And includes a lot of other things

987
01:01:48,820 --> 01:01:58,200
Speaker 2: that invariably any given party is leaving out. Thoughts? I

988
01:02:07,990 --> 01:02:09,150
Speaker 2: think we lost each other again.

989
01:02:09,170 --> 01:02:14,510
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think there's always a re-situation. A little bit.

990
01:02:17,350 --> 01:02:19,320
Speaker 1: I'll clip it there and then I'll start over again.

991
01:02:20,090 --> 01:02:25,200
Speaker 1: Because we need to close it out anyway. Yeah, I

992
01:02:25,240 --> 01:02:29,420
Speaker 1: think what Bart talks about here is there's a re-situation

993
01:02:29,460 --> 01:02:32,160
Speaker 1: that has to happen for the church to be the

994
01:02:32,200 --> 01:02:38,070
Speaker 1: church in the world. And we're always under pressure to

995
01:02:38,260 --> 01:02:42,770
Speaker 1: adopt the identities that the world gives us. And to

996
01:02:42,870 --> 01:02:47,740
Speaker 1: somehow think that we're defined by those identities as opposed

997
01:02:47,760 --> 01:02:49,860
Speaker 1: to being defined by Christ. And I think what he's

998
01:02:49,920 --> 01:02:52,940
Speaker 1: trying to get at in this whole letter is, look,

999
01:02:54,320 --> 01:02:57,600
Speaker 1: if the church is being the church, that's what needs

1000
01:02:57,660 --> 01:03:01,430
Speaker 1: to be done. And the decisions that come from the

1001
01:03:01,470 --> 01:03:04,010
Speaker 1: church being the church are going to be the faithful

1002
01:03:04,070 --> 01:03:07,350
Speaker 1: decisions that are according to the scriptures. And if they

1003
01:03:07,430 --> 01:03:10,270
Speaker 1: end up, you know, supporting the war, not supporting the war,

1004
01:03:10,350 --> 01:03:11,970
Speaker 1: people go out and buy war bonds. They don't go

1005
01:03:12,010 --> 01:03:15,720
Speaker 1: out and buy war bonds. These are things that I

1006
01:03:15,740 --> 01:03:19,660
Speaker 1: think he would leave up largely to individual discernment, so

1007
01:03:19,720 --> 01:03:25,580
Speaker 1: long as the church is being the church. And so, man,

1008
01:03:25,780 --> 01:03:28,400
Speaker 1: I don't know. I think this series has been interesting.

1009
01:03:28,420 --> 01:03:31,460
Speaker 1: I always love reading Barth. Like I said, I've enjoyed

1010
01:03:31,480 --> 01:03:34,940
Speaker 1: the Barman Declaration. I think it's a fantastic document, and

1011
01:03:34,960 --> 01:03:38,320
Speaker 1: I could see it informing a lot of what he's

1012
01:03:38,390 --> 01:03:41,890
Speaker 1: writing here. I'm not exactly sure the timeline of when

1013
01:03:41,930 --> 01:03:44,610
Speaker 1: these were written, whether Barman was first and this was second,

1014
01:03:44,730 --> 01:03:49,160
Speaker 1: but I think Barman was first. But either way, this

1015
01:03:49,930 --> 01:03:53,420
Speaker 1: has been a really great conversation and appreciate you throwing

1016
01:03:53,460 --> 01:03:56,120
Speaker 1: this letter out there so we could discuss it as

1017
01:03:56,180 --> 01:03:58,520
Speaker 1: part of our faith and politics series. So thanks, man.

1018
01:03:59,820 --> 01:04:00,380
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's been great.

1019
01:04:02,040 --> 01:04:04,320
Speaker 1: All right, everybody. Well, we're going to close this episode out.

1020
01:04:04,800 --> 01:04:06,720
Speaker 1: Keep listening to Thinking Christian. We're in the midst of

1021
01:04:06,820 --> 01:04:09,660
Speaker 1: a faith and politics series leading up to the midterm

1022
01:04:09,700 --> 01:04:12,450
Speaker 1: elections in November. And the goal really is to provide

1023
01:04:12,490 --> 01:04:15,230
Speaker 1: you with some different frameworks to think through how your

1024
01:04:15,290 --> 01:04:19,010
Speaker 1: faith connects to politics and how really these things should

1025
01:04:19,050 --> 01:04:24,360
Speaker 1: emerge so that you can love politically on God's terms

1026
01:04:24,520 --> 01:04:27,880
Speaker 1: as opposed to loving politically on the political party's terms.

1027
01:04:28,520 --> 01:04:32,280
Speaker 1: And so hopefully this has been helpful, good, helpful discussions,

1028
01:04:32,620 --> 01:04:34,700
Speaker 1: and just encourage you to take a listen to some

1029
01:04:34,720 --> 01:04:36,300
Speaker 1: of the other guests we've had on. We've had some

1030
01:04:36,340 --> 01:04:40,050
Speaker 1: great people on. So check out those episodes. And otherwise,

1031
01:04:40,090 --> 01:04:42,640
Speaker 1: we'll catch you on the next episode of Thinking Christian.

1032
01:04:42,930 --> 01:04:44,850
Speaker 1: Take care. Just want to take a second to thank

1033
01:04:44,890 --> 01:04:47,270
Speaker 1: the team at Life Audio for their partnership with us

1034
01:04:47,450 --> 01:04:50,830
Speaker 1: on the Thinking Christian podcast. If you go to lifeaudio.com,

1035
01:04:50,870 --> 01:04:53,990
Speaker 1: you'll find dozens of other faith-centered podcasts in their network.

1036
01:04:54,390 --> 01:04:57,590
Speaker 1: They've got shows about prayer, Bible study, parenting, and more.