Irony is the Element of Life
I like irony. I found two ironies this week:
1. A local unitarian universalist church has consistently displayed a sign, "Room for different beliefs. Yours." This week, however, on their display board was, I think though I can't explain it, a slam against Christianity. It read: "Prophet. Savior. Fool for the energizer bunny." I think it was supposed to read "Easter bunny," but someone accidentally put in "energizer bunny." Anyway, I am guessing that there would be no room at the inn for someone who believed that that fool is worthy of worship, especially in the most foolish act of the cross.
2. I found two volumes of Rudolf Bultmann's New Testament Theology in my church's library. At first I thought this was ironic in itself. But it's not. What's really ironic is that they deserve to be there in that experience is the basis for much evangelical faith today.
1. A local unitarian universalist church has consistently displayed a sign, "Room for different beliefs. Yours." This week, however, on their display board was, I think though I can't explain it, a slam against Christianity. It read: "Prophet. Savior. Fool for the energizer bunny." I think it was supposed to read "Easter bunny," but someone accidentally put in "energizer bunny." Anyway, I am guessing that there would be no room at the inn for someone who believed that that fool is worthy of worship, especially in the most foolish act of the cross.
2. I found two volumes of Rudolf Bultmann's New Testament Theology in my church's library. At first I thought this was ironic in itself. But it's not. What's really ironic is that they deserve to be there in that experience is the basis for much evangelical faith today.
posted by Aaron Perry at
2:10 PM
14 Comments:
"He lives! He lives! Christ Jesus lives today. He walks with me and talks with me along life's narrow way. He lives! He lives salvation to impart. You ask me how I know he lives? He lives within my heart."
This is Bultmann in a nutshell. And evangelical pietism, too. Alas, the irony to which you rightly point is no doubt lost on the vast majority of folks who sing this song with Gusto every Easter Sunday. Or is that Energizer Sunday?
SGFMB
I guess the irony of this is lost on me too. The mocking of "He Lives" leaves me cold.I believe that the ressurrection of Jesus was and is an historical fact. I also believe that Jesus lives in my heart. I don's these two beliefs as conflicting. If the reality of Jesus is ONLY subjective I think that's a big problem, but my faith is certainly confirmed by my experience and by a real and living relationship with Christ.
John
john, i'm glad you round out the objective nature of the faith. and you are most certainly correct that it is subjective. but mocking liberal lyrics never leaves me cold. and that is liberal theology in a nutshell: Christianity lifted from the realm of history and placed in the realm of faith.
The song he lives was written by Alfred Ackley in response to a liberal preacher on the radio declaring that it doesn't matter if the resurrection was a historical fact as long as we experience his truth.
I understand how one could interpret the lyrics in a liberal manner, but that's actually the opposite meaning of the song in its historical context.
Every song can't say everything. This song was actually meant to be a testimony that the resurrection was a historical fact, not just a feeling.
matt, i find it strange that ackley would go so far to defend his interlocutors point. consider the lines:
"I see his hand of mercy, I hear his voice of cheer, and just hte time I need him, he's always near."
"In all hte world around me I see his loving care, and tho my heart grow weary I never will despair."
The hymn rings of subjective pietism--the kind of pietism I find so frustrating. He has simply landed on the conservative side of the coin which already bears the mark of the beast called "liberal."
I expect Ackley was much more successful in stirring up those who believed with him, than offering a critique of his interlocutor.
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Your view seems overly critical to me. Again, every song can't cover everything. Every song isn't a theological text-book. In other words, there is nothing in the song the implies that he denies the historical fact of the resurrection. There is nothing in the song that implies the subjective is more important than the objective.
The song simply isn't that big. It's about the subjective and that is ok. It is a part of life.
Don't we all sometimes experience feelings of mercy, joy, focus, intimacy, love and courage from God? Of course we don't base our Christianity on feelings, but that doesn't mean we can't write about feelings.
Music, by its very nature, is an emotional language.
matt, you might be right--perhaps i am being overly critical. perhaps my lack of revivalist tendencies show through. however, the post was about bultmann and the song is bultmann in a nutshell and its defense may be proof of its irony.
you are also correct that there is nothing in the song that denies historicity of resurrection or that says the subjective experience of the faith is more important precisely because there is nothing in the song about those things.
most of all it may be the nerve being touched of emotional sway which tends to leave as quickly as it comes. or, i may just be crusty the last two days.
We were going to sing "He Lives" this Easter Sunday morning but after reading these comments I think we may switch to to Don't Cha' by the Pussycat Dolls. (Congragation please rise for the singing of Don't Cha. Ladies on verse one. "Don't cha wish your girlfriend was hot like me"
AP is either too generous or too tired to point out just how much of what has been written has missed my point. Since I wrote the initial observation, I guess it falls to me to re-make the point in a clearer way.
The song "He Lives" _is_ "Bultmann in a nutshell" precisely because it locates the key evidence for belief in the resurrection in the present subjective experience of the believer. Whether or not it is or was intended to challenge liberal disbelief in the resurrection was never a point I cared about in citing it in the first place. Nor do I care about it now. Nor does it challenge my original observation.
Which was and remains this: There is a deep affinity between certain brands of liberalism and certain brands of evangelicalism because both swim in the waters of subjective pietism.
Last, I was not mocking the song. (There are lots of other songs far more worthy of mockery--like that one that speaks of "love flowing and growing and rising deep inside of me"--I dunno. Sounds a little too phallic. At the altar of Dionysus, maybe. But not in the kingdom of God.) I was and am deadly serious about criticizing a faulty theology contained therein.
Now, if you want to talk about a rockin Easter hymn that does justice to the deep experience of present Easter faith while emphasizing the past "happenedness" of the resurrection, you can do no better than "Up from the Grave, he Arose!" But Keith Green's "Hear the Bells Ringing" runs a very close second.
While it may be true that "songs can't do everything," a good Easter song has to, by definition, link past event to present salvation. On that criterion, He Lives! fails.
So, Kirk, don't crank out the Pussycat Dolls just yet.
SGFMB
I still agree with your observation. I only disagreed with your illustration.
I think you assume too much by saying the song 'locates the key evidence for belief' in the subjective. It seems to me the song simply only refers to the subjective. The songwriter probably wasn't attempting to rank arguments.
To say the song has 'faulty theology' is, again, ignoring the genre. It has limited theology. Are you declaring that the author didn't experience God? Isn't he allowed to write a song about his experience with God?
But since we agree on your point, and even agree that a song connecting past events to present salvation is better, I see little reasont to argue such a minor point further.
God bless you this weekend,
matthew
"Up from the Grave He Arose" is my favorite Easter hymn! Let's agree to agree.
John
Ok Tim I won't but only cause you told me not too. I saw some picks today of the newest member of your family. Very nice. You are a studd.
i think at the root of the issue is the perry-tendency to be against revivalism--though two of us disagree as to exactly what constitutes revivalism.
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