The Power of Metaphors II (Doomsday Prophecies)

We might overlook it when seminarians don't "get" metaphors (see my last post), but what if a grown man doesn't get it and tries to tease literal meanings out of a metaphor? The metaphor in question is found in Second Peter, a verse echoing Psalm 90:

But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day [is] with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. 

Instead of enjoying the beautiful metaphor, an 89 year old prophet of doom named Harold Camping began a set of complicated calculations, and when he was done, he predicted that the end of the world will be here on May 21, 2011 at 6pm.

I know of at least one person who, when learning about Mr. Camping's predictions, withdrew all his funds and took off for parts unknown. But let's see ... other such predictions were made for 1844, 1914, 1918, 1925, 1942, 1981, 1983, 1988, 1989, 1992, 1993, 1994, 2012 and 2060.  Last time I checked, we and our messy beloved world are still here.

When at mid-day May 19, 1780 an inky darkness descended on Connecticut, so dark that birds retired to their nests and residents lit candles, citizens reached for an explanation in the source they knew best, the Bible. Now understood to have been a perfect storm of smoke and cloud cover, back then many people were convinced that it had to be Judgment Day. The countryside experienced a bit of a panic – save for one Connecticut legislator, Abraham Davenport, a Stamford legislator who said that if Jesus was coming, he preferred to be found working. Davenport asked for candles, and the Senate kept working through the gloom.

Martin Luther is reported to have said, "Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree".

- It's time to realize that doomsday predictions are nothing new under the sun.

- It's time to remember that talk about the "rapture" is not Biblical, and that millenialists and their calculations belong into the fiction section of your local bookstore.

- It's time to remember that Jesus said that not even he was privy to the date and time of the end.

The opposite of faith is fear, and fear-mongers always make money simply because people long for some measure of certainty.  Not only did Mr. Camping "earn" about 100 Million Dollars, he frightened a few drifting souls very badly: think of the mother who tried to slit her children's throats with a boxcutter, and the folks who said they were going to euthanize their pets before that 6pm deadline.

As the children of God, we have nothing to fear; uncertainty is part of life. With Martin Luther and Abraham Davenport, I intend to relax.  I will look forward to a beautiful new day, a day full of adventures, a day full of chances to meet God on the road.

2 Peter 3:8

The Power of Metaphors I (Good Shepherd Sunday)

When I was preparing my sermon for Good Shepherd Sunday, I couldn't help but think of the song I learned in Sunday School:

Here's one of the English translations that's been around for a good long while:

I am Jesus' little lamb,
Ever glad at heart I am;
For my Shepherd gently guides me,
Knows my need, and well provides me,
Loves me every day the same,
Even calls me by my name.


Day by day, at home, away,
Jesus is my Staff and Stay.
When I hunger, Jesus feeds me,
Into pleasant pastures leads me;
When I thirst, He bids me go
Where the quiet waters flow.


Who so happy as I am,
Even now the Shepherd's lamb?
And when my short life is ended,
By His angel host attended,
He shall fold me to His breast,
There within His arms to rest.

Even though the language and music are old-fashioned, the song gets one thing right that many a modern discussion of Psalm 23 gets wrong.

In a recent article a seminary professor felt the need to confess that his students and their unwillingness to understand the metaphors of Psalm 23 deeply humbled him. Admist the embittered reactions of the students, the professor states that he hastened to acknowledge his need to unlearn the presumptions and assumptions of his well educated past, and to embrace the level of language demanded by his students.  And I said, "WHAT!?"

The word metaphor derives from the 16th century Old French métaphore, in turn from the Latin metaphora, "carrying over", which is the latinisation of the Greek μεταφορά (metaphorá), “transfer”. A metaphor invites us to understand one thing in terms of another.  God's love and care for his creatures are expressed with the help of a set of metaphors taken from the simple world of a shepherd and his sheep.

Rather than forcing every word of the psalm into one dimension, the song above takes the metaphors of the psalm seriously; it assumes that people know that there is more than one layer to reality, and that spiritual realities often cannot be expressed in the flat one-dimensional language of newspapers and television.  It assumes further that "it's all about me" is not an exegetical strategy. Rather than about our fears about losing power and control ("Who wants a shepherd over them?" "I am not a sheep!"), the psalm is about God's grace and presence.  

In addition, singing about God's grace and presence becomes a powerful statement where people of faith are being oppressed. The simple line, "The Lord's my shepherd" becomes a confession in the context of persecution: "The Lord's my shepherd, and you are not."  Take away the metaphors and you take away the power of the psalm!

Psalm 23 

Baptism as a Way of Life: Musings on metaphors in Luther's teaching.

In our catechism class last Wednesday we talked about the powerful metaphors Martin Luther uses to indicate just how central baptism is for all of his theology. We mentioned three (the blackboard, the dog's house, and butter), and today I discovered another one, as I was reading an Epiphany sermon he preached on January 6, 1534.

THE BLACKBOARD is what Luther used when he felt under attack by the devil. He would write on that blackboard three words: ICH BIN GETAUFT, German for "I have been baptized", and as he kept looking at the words, he would find peace for his soul.

THE DOG'S HOUSE -- very unlike what Americans associate with "being in the dog house" -- stands for the protection Luther felt his baptism provided. It was the place to which he returned when he was out of sorts, spiritually and otherwise. "I crawl into it," he said, and then felt completely safe, reminded that even though he would fail again and again, the promise of salvation (embodied in baptism) would not.

BUTTER stands for how little Luther trusted faith without the tangible "signs" that were connected with it and grounded it: water, bread and wine. "Faith alone", he said, "is butter in the sun", because human beings are prone to fall for all sorts of seductive forces, unless they have something to hold on to that reminds them why their faith makes sense and is grounded in God's promise.

AQUAVIT. The metaphor I just discovered is that of Aquavit. In his Epiphany sermon, Luther makes fun of those theologians who think of baptism as "just water":  

"To be sure baptism is water. But today some are saying it is 'plain water'. ... My dog Tölpel (German for "blockhead"), a wild boar, and a cow know that. But what else is here? Without doubt, in baptism we get God-Father, Son, and Holy Spirit -- and all the angels! ... The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are in the water; it is the bath water of Christ, the presence of the Holy Spirit, the preaching of the Father. This makes it water that takes away sin, death, and every sadness, and helps a person into heaven. Water becomes a precious ointment and medication because God has stirred himself into it. The Father can bring a person to life, and he is in this water. That’s why it is the genuine Aquavit."  (Epiphany Sermon)

Long before the vodka companies rediscovered the word -- even in Luther's day -- Aquavit was a common term for distilled spirits. Luther revitalized baptism as a sacrament by not treating it like "something that happened a long time ago", but as a way of life; thus, his image of drowning Old Adam daily, so that a rejuvenated person would go forth into each new day.

"To put it most simply, the power, effect, benefit, fruit and purpose of baptism is to save. ... To be saved, we know, is nothing else than to be delivered from sin, death, and the devil and to enter into the kingdom of Christ and live with him forever."  (Large Catechism)

Matthew 3:1-18