Colleagues: See the definition of “grace” is section C-3. WES

 

TRINITY UNITED METHODIST CHURCH  

IHOP BIBLE STUDY
#3, Titus, "Expectation of believers in view of God’s grace" – with commentary. The purpose of the Letter to Titus is to examine, "Administration of the Church in General."  Today's study is the 3rd of 4 sessions

 

According to our Study Chart –

	4 Sessions Administration of the Church in General
This is the 3rd of 4 Sessions. Expectations of Believers in View of God’s Grace
Expectations of Believers (Christology)		Be Subject to Authorities (Obedience) Obedience to both civil authority and spiritual guidance are aspects of our surrender to God through our relationship to Christ; we obey because Christ first demonstrated how to fulfill our intended purpose.	Saving Grace of the Holy Spirit (Awakenment)
2: 11 – 15		3: 1 – 3	3: 4 – 8

 

ABOUT THIS SCRIPTURE

I.            What are the expectations of Believers?

A.           Vss. 2: 11 – 15, List what Paul expects believers to know about Christology.

WS: One IHOPer summarized Paul’s Christology as, “The grace of God has appeared that brings salvation to all. “

              I listed the following 8 characteristics: 1) Awakenment (salvation) to all; 2) Say “No,” to living in the antithesis of At-One-Ment; 3) Our desire for independence from God as part of our natural/human inclinations; 4) Live the humane and gracious life working for justice and mercy; 5) Live the awakened life always in the present moment;. 6) Wait for the Awakened life and then live the Awakened life; 7) Wait for the opportunity to pull your life through Christ; 8) We are transformed from lives that are the antithesis of God’s plan for us to live our intended purpose of living humane and gracious lives working for justice and mercy.

 

1.           Ground the meaning of “salvation:” The Garden Story and beyond.

WS: To set the context for my answer to this question, I read to those gathered the following from the book, The Shack. This is a book by William P. Young that gave me a new way to talk about the human condition as an expression of our “independence from God.”  This is the purpose of the Genesis story: Adam and Eve choose to dis-obey God; i.e., to choose their “independence” over obedience or surrender to God. For this, their punishment is to be removed “forever” from God’s presence; i.e., living in the Garden. However, God changes God’s mind, and sends Jesus, the Son, to demonstrate how to live so as to be returned to life in the Garden. The method for this return is for us to die to our independence from God! That is, for us to return to live an obedient and surrendered life. The reward for our actions is that we fulfill our intended purpose of living the humane and gracious life working for justice and mercy.

              Now, to the book. I shared with the IHOPers the following context for the quoted material.

              Recently, I finished reading the book, The Shack. It’s not a long book, it is inexpensive, and I encourage you to buy it and read it. ** The story is about Mackenzie who is the father of several children. One weekend, his wife and one daughter go to visit relatives, while the rest of them go on a camp-out in the mountains. While Mack is rescuing his son and an older daughter in a tipped canoe, Missy, a grade school age child is left coloring at the picnic table. She is abducted and murdered. Eventually, they find her body in “The Shack.” Mack is grief-stricken, angry and guilty for leaving her alone.

              One day he receives a note in his mailbox signed, “Papa.” Only his wife ever called God “Papa,” so the message is from someone who really knows the family. It is an invitation to come meet with The Trinity who want to help him deal with the situation and his spiritual condition; his life is damaged. The place they want to meet is at “The Shack.”

              Reluctantly accepting the invitation, Mack returns to the shack where he meets God in the form of a big black woman whose nickname is “Papa.” She explains to Mack that she has taken this form because she doesn’t want to deal with Mack’s pre-conceptions of what God looks like. Jesus is type-cast as a Middle-Eastern carpenter. Duh! The Holy Spirit is an Asian woman who collects tears in a bottle and is as light as the air.

              In one poignant conversation between the four of them, Mack wishes to clarify the roles played by each. This is the following conversation.

              “You know what I am talking about, “ Mack was a little frustrated. “I am talking about who’s in charge. Don’t you have a chain of command?”

              “Chain of command? That sounds ghastly,” Jesus said.

              “At least binding,’ Papa added as they both started laughing, and then Papa turned to Mack and sang, “Through chains be of gold, they are chains all the same.”

              “Now don’t concern yourself with those two,” Sarayu interrupted, reaching out her hand to comfort and calm him. “They’re just playing with you. This actually is a subject of interest among us.”

              Mack nodded, relieved and a little chagrined that he had again allowed himself to lose his composure.

              “Mackenzie, we have no concept of final authority among us, only unity. We are a circle of relationship, not a chain of command or ‘great chain of being’ as your ancestors termed it. What you’re seeing here is relationship without any overlay of power. We don’t need power over the other because we are always looking out for the best. Hierarchy would make no sense among us. Actually, this is your problem, not ours.”

              “Really? How so?”

              “Humans are so lost and damaged [Italics mine] that to you it is almost incomprehensible that people could work or live together without someone being in charge.”

              “But every human institution that I can think of, from political to business, even down to marriage, is governed by this kind of thinking: it is the web of our social fabric,” Mack asserted.

              “Such a waste” said Papa, picking up an empty dish and heading for the kitchen.

              “It’s one reason why experiencing true relationship is so difficult for you,” Jesus added. “Once you have a hierarchy you need rules to protest and administer it, and then you need law and the enforcement of rules, and you end up with some kind of chain of command or a system of order that destroys relationship rather than promotes it. You rarely see or experience relationship apart from power. Hierarchy imposes laws and rules and you end up missing the wonder of relationship that we intended for you.”

              “Well, " said Mack sarcastically, sitting back in his chair. “We sure seem to have adapted pretty well to it.”

              Sarayu was quick to reply, “Don’t confuse adaptation for intention, or seduction for reality.”

(Young William P.,  The Shack,  Los Angeles:windblown,  2007, pp. 122, 123.)

** Go to Amazon.com and look for the Used Book section.

 

WS: With this understanding in hand, then “salvation” is the experience of surrendering our independence from At-One-Ment, and being re-awakened to live in the presence of God that is experienced as Perfect At-One-Ment.

2.           What are the affects of impiety and worldly passion?

WS: Impiety and worldly passion are affects of our choosing independence over surrender to Christ; that is not choosing to pull our everyday life through obedience to Christ. This is our true freedom!

 

3.           What is the experience of being redeemed?  (No Head Trips, please. Identify your              experience.)

WS: Redemption is experienced as transforming our independence into obedience to live as Jesus lived.

 

4.           What is the experience of being purified? (No Head Trips, please. Identify your       experience.)

WS: I told the IHOPers that I struggled with the difference between “redemption” and “purification.” One IHOPer suggested our evidence of a lack of guilt is evidence of being purified.  Another said it reminded her of John Wesley’s understanding of “going on to perfection.” Still another said, we are washed as if in water. And one more added, that this could be understood as an oxymoron, “We are washed white and snow in the blood of the lamb.”

 

B.          Vss. 3: 1  -- 3, List the elements of obedience.

WS: One IHOPer summarize obedience as “being holy.” Another reported: 1) whatever is good; 2) not slandering anyone; 3) being peaceful and considerate; 4) practicing true humility.

 

1.           Vs. 3, How does the Gut Trip formula of, “Living the humane and gracious working for         justice and mercy” associate with what Paul says.

WS: Regarding Vs. 3A, Paul regards the following as living the humane and gracious life: We do good and we are rewarded with good; we do mean and we are rewarded with disrespect.

              Vs. 3B, The group suggested that the New Testament “Foolish Farmer” was an example. The farmer believed he could store up good things against the day he might experience trouble. As it happened he had full barns, but one night death calls for him, and all of his labors are for nothing.  (Luke 12: 13 – 20)

 

2.           Vs. 3: 3, How do you relate to the contents of this verse?

WS: Our present human experience is to live as the antithesis of At-One-Ment.  We live to fulfill our everyday human/natural inclinations for sex, food, housing and security (Maslov’s principles).

 

 

 

C.          Vss. 3: 4 – 8, Write a paragraph on Paul’s understanding of the doctrine of the Holy              Spirit

WS: The following is my effort in using Gut Trip Analysis as the tool to write a summery of Paul’s understanding of the Holy Spirit.

              We experience the Holy Spirit as we awake through an event that confirms our intended purpose of living the humane and gracious life working for justice and mercy. This happens when we pull our existence through the example of Jesus Christ. The result is we experience ourselves as whole, wholesome, healthy, authentic, real and living in At-One-Ment with all creation.

 

1.           Vs. 3: 5, Using your own experience, clarify what Paul means by “God’s mercy”

WS: I am created dependent on God., and when I choose to be independent of God I feel guilty and worthless. I turn away from others, and they from me when I choose to live independent of this purpose.

 

2.           What is it like being “renewed by the Holy Spirit?”

WS: It is like coming home after being on vacation. One IHOPer observed, “It is like a breath of fresh air when we open the house to the cool evening breeze. Another likened this experience to the Lord’s Supper in which we get to start over again. Still another IHOPer offered that this renewal is getting rid of a heavy bag of sin.

 

3.           Vs. 7: Ground the following words in Gut Trip Analysis:

WS: The following definitions use Gut Trip Analysis.

              Justified—Justification occurs as an awakening event to transform my selfish/natural inclinations to live independent from my intended purpose as a humane creation which is to live the humane and gracious life working for justice and mercy.

              Grace—The danger of most old Christian Code Words is that they are understood as something that is added on to our lives, instead of the acknowledgement of that which protects us from failing to fulfill our intended purpose. A cow fulfills its cowness by grace; a tree fulfills its treeness by grace. Humans fulfill our intended purpose by never being let off the hook of our humaneness. God loves us so much that as we constantly choose to live independent of our need for God, God still demands that we live the humane life. To this end, our self-story is that God sent Jesus Christ to demonstrate living the humane and gracious life working for justice and mercy, and demonstrating that it is possible for us to die to the barriers preventing us from this self-fulfillment; i.e., we can die to our independence, selfishness, denial and ignorance of our intended purpose.

              It is so important to understand this shift in understanding and experience. This points to the revolutionary character of Jesus’ ministry and message. Jesus turned the world up-side-down and inside-out at this point! This is the “offense of the Gospel;” i.e., we believe we can be more than human by adding grace to our lives. Jesus demonstrates that we already are all the “human” we will ever be, but we can be all that we can be by living the humane and gracious life working for justice and mercy. Thank God for Jesus!

              Eternal life—Phil Meckly, the religion teacher at Kansas Wesleyan University, makes the distinction between “eternal life” and “everlasting life.” The latter is a concept of time that just never stops.

              The former is the theology that as we pull our life through the demonstration of Jesus Christ that we are participating in “eternal life.” Only God is considered eternal. Hence, as we exchange our independence FROM GOD for our obedience and surrender TO GOD, we are standing in the presence of The Eternal. Eternal life is living with God, living as the Awakened, Living in At-One-Ment.

 

 

 

II.           Reflect on the following:  (GETTING THE BIG PICTURE) **

             Part 2 is an exercise in reflecting on the assigned reading through a method of identifying the "Deep Problem" faced by the early church. Sometimes this is known as identifying the underlying contradiction. This is usually hidden behind some particular manifestations. Paul usually addresses this hidden agenda in his "solution" that he offers. Consequently, it is necessary for us to examine his solutions, and then back up to reflect on what is the deeper problem actually being addressed. Usually, this reveals some new insights.

 

A.           What is the SURFACE PROBLEM that is manifested?           

              Check out the following Vss. 2: 11 – 15 (Implied)

              How does the Cretan church demonstrate Christological signs of ignorance?

WS: Not teaching with authority; do not have a comprehensive education model of Christology.     

 

C.        IDENTIFY THE DEEPER UNDERLYING CONTRADICTION facing the Cretan Church.           What is the DEEPER, MORE HIDDEN, agenda that Paul seeks to address with his      solution?

               Use your intuitions to identify the deeper problem.

              Check out the following Vss. 3: 1 – 3  (Implied)

              What is the implied “DEEP UNDERLYING CONTRADICTION?”

              How does the Cretan church demonstrate their difficulty with Christian obedience?

WS: Living independently of God that is experienced as Perfect At-One-Ment.

              The Cretan church attempted to live independently of the humane and gracious life. Observe that this is both an individual and an institutional situation.

 

WHICH OF THE FOUR MASTER PROBLEMS DOES THIS ISSUE REPRESENT? **

___ False Teachings     _X_ Moral Decay  ___The Corrupt World  __  Church Division

 

 

B.        What is the SOLUTION Paul offers to address the Deep Problem? Speculate on what          Paul is suggesting the solution

              Check out the following Vss. 3: 4 – 8  (Implied)

              What would it mean to become an “heir of hope and renewal?”

WS: Accept the gift of God that holds our feet to the fire of fulfilling our intended purpose for living the humane and gracious life working for justice and mercy.

 

WHICH OF THE THREE MASTER SOLUTIONS DOES THIS ISSUE REPRESENT?**

 

___Create Authentic Ministry   __Use Spiritual Weapons  _X_ Utilize Consciousness Raising

             

Now, reread Paul's solution to see if it makes sense.  

          Alright folks, talk to me! 

** Use the  "Problems and Solutions" chart previously sent to you. This chart is available in the archived materials at www.triumc.org/web1/biblestudy. Look for the Chart link.  WES