Posted: 2/04/05

Superheroes offer insights into
human nature, social observers say

WASHINGTON (RNS)–When he was growing up, Mike Mignola had two great loves–monster movies and superheroes. So when Dark Horse Comics offered him the chance to write and illustrate his own comic book, Mignola decided to combine the two.

The result is Hellboy, a wisecracking, good-hearted, old-fashioned superhero with one problem: He's a red-skinned, cloven-hoofed demon summoned by the Nazis to bring about the end of the world. When the Nazis' plans are foiled, the then-infant Hellboy is taken in and raised by human beings. He forsakes his demon heritage and pledges to fight for good.

But can he really escape his destiny? Mignola, who has been writing Hellboy comics since 1993, isn't sure.

“It's the ultimate question of predestination versus free will,” said Mignola from his home in New York City. “It really is a quandary.”

Mignola has discovered one of the untold secrets of the comic book world. It's the characters, not the costumes and secret identities, that matter most. From Superman to the recent Pixar film The Incredibles, comics have served as social parables, with superhuman characters revealing insights about the human condition.

In The Incredibles, superheroes are forced into hiding when public opinion turns against them. Mr. Incredible turns in his costume and “Incredible-mobile” for a Yugo-sized commuter car and a desk job at an insurance company.

But he can't give up the desire to save people, no matter what it costs his family.

“It's not about super powers,” says Michael Brewer, lifelong comics fan and author of a new book about “finding virtue, vice and what's holy” in comics, Who Needs a Superhero?

“It's about finding your place in the world and, dare I say, family values.”

Brewer, pastor of Crescent Springs (Ky.) Presbyterian Church, has been weaving comic book stories into his sermons for 25 years.

Some observers see Hellboy (above) as an example of how comic book characters can become parables portraying the human condition. (Illustration courtesy of Dark Horse Comics)

He says The Incredibles, like classic comics Batman and Superman, shows characters who find meaning in suffering.

“Batman has a choice when his parents are killed,” Brewer said. “He can be crippled for life or deal with tragedy in a way that makes the world a better place. Superman loses everything–his world, his family, his home.

“Instead of remaining a stranger, he decides to adopt these people of Earth as his own.”

Another example can be found in the pages of the Green Arrow comic. Green Arrow has recently taken on a sidekick named Mia, who was once a teenage runaway. During her days on the street, she contracted HIV.

“Having faced the trouble in her life,” Brewer said, “she wants to make a difference in the world. I can't think of a more heroic thing to do.”

Brewer, whose comic book collection tops 10,000 issues, argues that comics often showcase Christian virtues like humility and being a servant.

In one of his favorite storylines, super villain Lex Luthor programs a computer to discover the connection between Superman and Clark Kent. When the computer concludes Kent is Superman, Luthor cannot believe it.

How would a being with Superman's powers be content as a lowly newspaper reporter?

Superman is content as Clark Kent, “because he is genuinely good,” said Brewer.

“He has superhuman power, and he has chosen to use it responsibly and not for his own benefit. That's not a far cry from Jesus, who could have summoned legions of angels to save himself from the cross and didn't.”

Posted: 2/04/05

Texas Tidbits

DBU to launch leadership studies doctoral program. Dallas Baptist University will launch a doctor of philosophy program in leadership studies next fall through its recently renamed Gary Cook Graduate School of Leadership and Christian Education. Karen Bullock is academic director of the new doctoral program.

UMHB offers Spanish for Christian workers. The University of Mary Hardin-Baylor will offer a course for Christian workers in conversational Spanish, June 1-30. The introductory course presents the basic structures of Spanish, with vocabulary especially adapted to Christian witness. It includes extensive use of Scripture and dialogues geared to common witnessing situations, a conversational approach with alternating class presentations and lab practice. Cost is $1,000, which includes tuition, fees and books. The course is equivalent to two semester hours of Spanish. University housing is available for an additional $285 per person. To register, contact Judy Arnold at (254) 295-4631 or e-mail jarnold@umhb.edu.

ETBU sets Tiger Day. East Texas Baptist University will hold its annual Tiger Day preview event for prospective students and their families March 5. For more information, or to register, visit the school's website at www.etbu.edu or call (800) 804-ETBU.

Health care fellowships set San Antonio meeting. "With These Hands–Touching the World in Jesus' Name" is the theme of the Baptist Medical Dental Fellowship and Baptist Nursing Fellowship as they gather for their national meeting March 17-20 at First Baptist Church in San Antonio. Albert Reyes, president of Baptist University of the Americas and the Baptist General Convention of Texas, will speak on "missions in a changing world," and Javier Elizondo, dean at BUA, will lead Bible studies. Workshop topics include starting a church-based medical/dental clinic and "How Do I Get Involved in an International Healthcare Missions Project?" Continuing education credits are available for health care professionals. Medical missionary Sam Cannata will be the speaker at a fiesta-style banquet March 19 at San Antonio's Crowne Plaza Hotel. For more information, visit www.bmdf.org, e-mail BFDF1@cs.com, call (888) 275-8485 or write to the Baptist Medical Dental Fellowship at 920 Madison Ave., Suite 825, Memphis, Tenn. 38103.

Posted: 2/04/05

TOGETHER:
Vision demands a new spirit of unity

As President Bush delivered his State of the Union address, an Iraqi woman lifted her ink-stained finger in appreciation to the president and Congress. She had voted in her first free election a few days earlier. Moments later, the parents of a slain American soldier from Pflugerville stood to received heartfelt gratitude from the crowd.

When the Iraqi woman turned around to thank the mother of the soldier who had given his life in Iraq, they fell into each other arms in a tight and emotional embrace. One was a mother whose heart was broken but proud of her son. The other was an Iraqi woman amazed that she and her people had been able to vote freely and to begin the long journey toward a democratic society. Our hearts went out to that mother and father and to the young woman who would never know the names of all the men and women, American and Iraqi, who have been wounded or died so she and her fellow citizens could live in freedom.

Executive Director BGCT Executive Board

Is there anything for which you would be willing to lay down your life? Listen to Jesus. He never advocated taking another's life, but he did lay down his own. And he invited those who would follow him to take up their cross as well. A cross is where people die. But Jesus promised, “Whoever loses his life for me and for the gospel will save it” (Mark 8:34-35). The Apostle Paul pleaded: “I urge you … to offer your bodies as living sacrifices. … Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind” (Romans 12:1-2).

I asked those who helped me draft the Baptist General Convention of Texas vision statement to ask God for a vision so bold, so full of Christ's passion, so right for the time in which we now live that Texas Baptists would be willing to draw together in a new spirit of cooperation and unity, so exciting and powerful that we would be willing to give our lives to see it accomplished unto the glory of God.

As we studied the Scriptures and prayed for God's guidance, the vision below formed in our hearts. Our convention adopted it last November. I encourage you to ask God to paint in your soul a picture of what we can be unto his glory.

We are a fellowship of transformational churches sacrificially giving ourselves to God's redemptive purpose. Continually being transformed by the power of the Holy Spirit into the likeness of Christ, we join together to transform our communities and the world. Engaging culture, we reach people where they are for an encounter with Christ.

We are on mission with God to continue Jesus' ministry of teaching, sharing the good news and meeting human needs through our churches, institutions and organizations. Our ministries reflect the heart of Jesus.

We share a vision of the world's peoples coming to know Jesus Christ and becoming transformed in his image. As a fellowship of diverse churches, we advance the kingdom in ways individual churches cannot do alone, and we celebrate our unity in the larger body of Christ's church. As local churches, we are called to be the presence of Christ in the world.

We accomplish our work through individuals with diverse backgrounds who love Jesus Christ and his church. Lives, families, communities and nations are transformed as ordinary Christians take extraordinary steps of faith in obedience to God.

Could you place your life at God's disposal for a vision like that?

We are loved.

Posted: 2/04/05

THE FIRST WAVE:
Texas Baptist volunteers return from Sri Lanka

By John Hall

Texas Baptist Communications

Sri Lanka looks like the aftermath of a fatal "car wreck." The bodies are gone, but the devastation remains a vivid reminder of the pain caused by a series of tsunamis that slammed the island nation, volunteers with the first wave of Texas Baptist Men relief reported.

Empty land along the coast is all that remains where people once filled villages, Matt Patterson said. Homes are damaged, as are many other structures. The industrial infrastructure is largely gone. Landmines that heavily cover some areas of the country are one of the few signs of civilization along the coast. People wear smiles, but pain lies just beneath them.

“People were killed, but people are smiling,” said Patterson of Hunters' Glen Baptist Church in Plano. “It's a feeling that is hard to explain because you don't feel it every day. You don't want to feel it every day.”

Texas Baptist volunteers regularly heard stories of children rushing to their deaths just before the tsunamis hit. As the waves neared the shore, water along the coast receded quickly and exposed pockets of fish that flopped on the sand. Children ran to grab them, only to be slammed by surges of water.

Another man said he went to town and returned to find his wife and children gone. “His heart will never be the same,” said Larry Blanchard, a member of First Baptist Church in Lindale. “We just loved on him, hugged him.”

That experience is typical of some of the help that Texas Baptist Men brought with them. Chaplains were part of the teams, but anyone who would listen was helpful.

“A lot of these people need a shoulder to cry on,” said David Beckett, a missionary in Sri Lanka who recently was named director of Children's Emergency Relief International's work in the country.

Texas Baptist Men also brought help in the form of supplies. After some initial struggles, volunteers perfected a way to clean wells that have been contaminated by saltwater. Ten water purification teams each cleaned about 25 wells a day.

As the teams moved across Sri Lanka, children and adults began leading them from well to well. They communicated with Texas Baptist volunteers as best they could, mostly relying on hand gestures. That was good enough. The Texans trained Sri Lankans to clean the wells.

A father and daughter wait their turn at a medical clinic near Eravur, in the Batticaloa district of eastern Sri Lanka. (Photo by Rex Campbell)

The teams gave pumps and supplies to local pastors who can use them as tools to share the Christian message. Recovery will move faster with more people cleaning wells, leaders said.

Texas Baptist disaster relief workers also set up a mobile kitchen that has fed thousands near Batticaloa. The teams attempted to set up a kitchen in a refugee camp, but the Sri Lankan government told them to stop because it wants people to return to their villages rather than staying in the camps.

Texas Baptist Men provided a washer and dryer to get a Sri Lankan hospital functioning once again. The institution had run out of clean linens to use for its patients and was afraid of spreading infections.

In the process of bringing relief, the volunteers are altering many Sri Lankans' image of Americans and especially Christians. Residents commonly told the teams they did not expect Christians to help without trying to trick them. Those conversations opened witnessing opportunities.

Much work remains. For the people to return to their villages, the wells must be cleaned. Homes will need to be built. The industrial infrastructure needs to be recreated. The challenge is great, but Texas Baptist Men is meeting needs, Blanchard said.

“There's literally thousands of wells to do down there,” he said. “You say, 'How could we make a difference?' Well, to those who needed water, we made a difference.”

Posted: 2/04/05

Hungarian Baptist Aid sets

pace in global disaster relief

By Tony Cartledge

North Carolina Biblical Recorder

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka (ABP)–Americans might not think of Hungarians as being in the forefront of international relief efforts, but a relatively young Hungarian organization is a pacesetter in worldwide disaster relief.

Hungarian Baptist Aid was founded in 1996 by Sandor Szenczy, a Baptist pastor who continues to serve as president, according to Ferenc Tisch, director of international operations for the organization. Prior to that, Tisch said, Hungarians sought mainly to aid other socialist countries.

Hungarian Baptist Aid has helped Hungarians understand the importance of helping all people, he said. The group has been among the first organizations on the ground–and one of the last to leave–in several recent disasters, including the killer earthquake that leveled Bam, Iran, Dec. 26, 2003, exactly one year before South Asia's tsunami.

“People think of us as 'those crazy Hungarians,'” Tisch said. “We were still in Iran after other relief organizations had left.”

Tisch hopes Hungarian Baptist Aid will be able to follow the same pattern of relief in Sri Lanka that proved helpful in Iran. Initial relief there was followed by long-term development efforts, medical projects and establishment of orphanages, he said.

Posted: 2/04/05

Baptist relief focuses on new homes, pure water

By John Hall

Texas Baptist Communications

Now that Texas Baptist volunteers have learned how best to meet the needs of Sri Lankans, their disaster relief efforts are pushing forward with constructing homes and cleaning water wells.

Texas Baptist Men workers have identified the ideal way to clean contaminated wells across the country and have started to implement that process, said TBM Executive Director Leo Smith. A cleaning team can service as many as 30 wells a day working alongside Sri Lankans.

To further expedite the process, TBM volunteers are training residents to clean their wells and are equipping pastors with pumps and tractors. The ministers can use those supplies as tools to improve people's lives and share the gospel.

TBM workers also are building a model frame for houses that can be duplicated across the island. The metal frame will be approved by the Sri Lankan government, and residents will be trained in how to weld them together.

Initially, residents will be able to throw tarps across the frames for temporary housing, but over time they will be able to build walls out of cinder blocks or other materials, Smith said.

Training Sri Lankans gives residents skills they can use later, Smith noted. It also provides a continuing boost to the economy as Texas Baptist Men continues buying supplies in Sri Lanka.

“I think we've just touched the surface of the opportunities available to us,” said Dick Talley, TBM logistics coordinator. “We need to stay faithful in everything we promise we are going to do.”

David Beckett, a missionary in Sri Lanka who initially contacted Texas Baptists, has been named director of Sri Lanka ministry for Children's Emergency Relief International, an arm of Baptist Child & Family Services. Beckett is in the process of registering his organization as a nongovernmental aid agency in Sri Lanka so it can begin working to establish a foster care system within the country.

Posted: 2/04/05

By Terri Jo Ryan

Special to the Baptist Standard

WACO–Chris Seay once told Mother Jones, a countercultural political magazine, he had been laid up in a hospital bed with appendicitis and a raging fever when God spoke to him. And the divine instructions were precise: Open a church for 20-somethings in Waco on Jan. 15, 1995.

Seven weeks later, right on schedule, Seay and David Crowder, a Waco-based recording artist, launched University Baptist Church. That first Sunday, about 275 people showed up.

Today, weekly attendance is about 600, and the church still is catering to the generation known to demographers as the Millennials. Something between a coffeehouse, comedy club and a catacomb, University Baptist Church meets in a cavernous space painted in Mardi Gras hues and sporting an ear-numbing sound system–not your father's Christian sanctuary.

And that's the point. This congregation, Baptist in name and doctrine but eclectic and ecumenical in flavor, is 97 percent college-aged–and 100-percent committed to “living in community” with other followers of Jesus Christ, said Kyle Lake, its pastor the last four years.

In mid-1999, when Seay left Waco to start a similar postmodern congregation in Houston, University Baptist tapped Lake as pastor to lead the flock of 20-somethings whom some observers have called “a flash mob of the Holy Spirit.” The regulars–including a handful of families and a few high-schoolers–spurn rigid religious ritual and base their worship services around music, art and video presentations.

“We value the arts,” Lake said. “We are trying to reclaim the arts. Even the walls speak to our desire to glorify God.”

Indeed, the ambience is mostly late attic, early garage sale. But by the pastor's office, a mural based on Michelangelo's God giving Adam the spark of life harkens back to an age when almost all art was religious and almost all songs were hymns.

University Baptist Church pastors, (left to right), Kyle Lake, senior pastor; Ben Dudley, community pastor, and David Crowder, music and arts pastor; lead worship. (Photo by Duane A. Laverty/Waco Tribune-Herald)

“The backside,” a dark, spacious room at the back of the building, is furnished through the thrift stores of Waco, Lake said. An offbeat collection of kitchen chairs and tables and couches aplenty are grouped into conversation pits or around another stage and even more band stand equipment, like a high-schooler's basement hangout for his or her pals.

Music is vital to how this generation communicates, Lake said. “It is how we express ourselves as human beings.”

But for all the tie-dyed, velvet or Madras fabrics, edgy website or other funky slacker chic at UBC, Lake said: “We also embrace church history. We look to the pitfalls and windfalls of the early church to give us direction in the here and now.”

So, it is not unusual to see a stone statue of the Virgin Mary in a niche, surrounded by candles, although such a sight would be out of character for most Baptist churches. A vintage depiction of St. Nicholas, bishop of Myra, reaching into his big red sack of toys is posted outside the church nursery. In another niche near the pastor's office is the familiar presence of St. Francis, who has been embraced by the counterculture because he communed with animals and all of creation.

“We're not anti-history or anti-tradition here,” Lake said. “Some people in the church come from a (Roman) Catholic background. We consider ourselves 'catholic' in the universal sense of the word.”

Seay started the church near the Baylor campus in 1995 as a mission of Beverly Hills Baptist Church. With the help of Waco Baptist Association and the Baptist General Convention of Texas, the church started meeting–first in a cinderblock building it quickly outgrew and then the Hippodrome Theatre in downtown Waco. The last seven years, members have worshipped in a former grocery store.

Paul Stripling, emeritus director of missions for Waco Baptist Association, was one of the early supporters of the church and its approach. Some of his Baptist colleagues, Stripling said, were “less than enthusiastic” when hearing the proposal from the casually clad, spiky-haired and goatee-chinned Seay. But their skepticism was swept away by the success of the youthful enterprise.

Stripling recalled the “miraculous, explosive growth” of the new church, which met in the old 12th Street Mission for less than two months until it outgrew the space.

Lake said the young people he ministers to, at a very transitional stage of life, are searching for a community at the same time they are pushing away from the tribe of their birth.

“We connect with students when they are asking themselves who they are and what they are doing here and differentiating their own beliefs versus what their parents believe,” Lake said.

The typical member, at least at the start, is a “disillusioned college student who perhaps dropped out of church for a few years, or feel God is irrelevant to their lives. They equate church with God, which is not necessarily so.”

Lake said critics who deride emergent Christianity as being all about the haircuts and the music and shoes and the thrift-store threads, tattoos and body-piercings, are missing the point. “Let's look past the exterior and through the stereotype.”

His flock do not choose to immerse themselves in a Christian bubble, but engage the world. People who attend University Baptist become practiced in the tension between living in the world but not swallowing the whole culture uncritically, he added.

When Community Pastor Ben Dudley, a maturing 20-something, was a freshman at Baylor University a decade ago, he discovered something distinctively different about University Baptist.

“I had grown up in church. I was already really weary of church, to tell the truth,” he said. “But there was no other place like University Baptist. It was so unique. It was fun being around other college students. You could see immediately that this was real. We were on a journey together just to know the love of God.”

A shared vulnerability binds ministers and members, he added. As people who acknowledge their own human frailty and imperfections, they respect leaders who are as “authentic” as they are, not hiding behind a facade of pseudo-perfection. The Bible, after all, is peopled with characters who lie, cheat, steal, get intoxicated, fornicate and commit murder, but God has a purpose for them, he said.

“It's hard to try to be perfect, and that just puts you under undue pressure. It sets you up to fail,” Dudley said. “So I try to live life in the realization that it's by God's grace that I find salvation. It's not my doing good; it's his doing good.”

Posted: 2/04/05

Black Baptist leaders speak to social and political issues

By Robert Marus

ABP Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON (ABP)—Leaders of four historically black Baptist denominations closed a landmark joint meeting by issuing a statement on several social and political issues affecting the African-American community.

Meeting in Nashville over a four-day period, officials of the National Baptist Convention USA, the National Baptist Convention of America, the Progressive National Baptist Convention and the National Missionary Baptist Convention of America came together “to participate in collective dialogue about the issues that are important to the survival of the African-American community,” according to a press release from the groups.

Many of the speakers heard by the estimated 10,000 participants dealt with social issues on which the four groups can find common ground, including opposition to government funding of private schools.

The meeting was the first major reunion in 90 years between any of the four groups—formed by schisms within older denominational groups in 1915, 1961 and 1988. While the groups ruled out a formal merger, they pledged to work together.

“A lot of times, we’re talking about the same things but don’t always know it because we’re in four different settings,” said George Brooks, head of educational programs for the National Baptist Convention of America.

The splits in 1915 and 1988 were mainly over control of denominational agencies. But the 1961 division was the most famous. In it, Martin Luther King Jr. and other Baptist leaders who supported the civil-rights movement left to found the Progressive National Baptist Convention after the National Baptist Convention USA elected a president who was less supportive of active resistance to segregation.

Recently President Bush and the Republican Party have attempted to woo African-Americans, who vote heavily Democratic, with stances on social issues that have resonance in a black community that is generally socially conservative. Recently, Bush has met with African-American religious leaders as well as members of the Congressional Black Caucus.

However, the presidents of the four Baptist groups issued a joint statement that opposed many of Bush’s stances. The statement grew from consensus on the issues reached by the conference participants, the leaders said.

The statement opposed the war in Iraq, government funds for scholarships to parochial and other private schools, and Bush’s nomination of Alberto Gonzales as attorney general.

It said the war was “a costly and unnecessary military action begun on grossly inaccurate, misconstrued or distorted intelligence against a nation that did not pose an immediate or realistic threat to the national security of our nation.” It also said the Bush administration should focus more on problems at home. “Democracy in the United States deserves at least as much attention as democracy abroad,” the statement read.

In a keynote address to the delegates, former Democratic presidential candidate and Baptist minister Jesse Jackson questioned Bush’s use of the gay-marriage issue as a way to court support among religious African-Americans.

According to media reports, Jackson asked the participants if any of their churches had been asked to perform same-sex marriages. When none responded, he asked, “Then how did that get in the middle of our agenda?” The audience reportedly stood and cheered.

Posted: 1/21/05

Sri Lankan sign asks, “Is there any hope for refugees like us?”

By Tony Cartledge

North Carolina Biblical Recorder

GALLE, Sri Lanka (ABP)—On the waterfront in Galle City, a road runs parallel to the beach, but there are no cabanas and beach chairs to be seen. Large, colorful shrimp boats lean together on the curb, ripped from their moorings and swept ashore by the infamous tsunami of Dec. 26. Across the street, a long city block has been turned to rubble.

A small Hindu shrine stands partly preserved amid mattress-sized chunks of broken concrete. Parts of two walls remain. Leaning against the broken roof is a crude hand-lettered sign painted on a scrap of plywood. In the swirling cursive script of Sinhalese, it asks, “Is there any hope for refugees like us?”

Behind the sign is an expanse of debris where many houses once stood. Thick concrete and cinderblock walls lie toppled and broken like a child’s Lego set that has been stepped on. A small boat sits near a mattress and a bicycle wheel. House numbers have been scribbled onto paper taped to bits of wall lying about, feeble reminders of where proud homes once stood.

A slim, brown woman picks through the flattened debris of her home. Her name is Weeregoda Mashashi Niluka Priyanthi. She and her husband were working at a nearby bus stand when the tsunami hit. Like hundreds of others, her husband was swept away by the giant waves.

Her daughter was at home but ran inland when the first wave came, and survived. Now every day mother and daughter return to the ruined spot where their home once stood, looking for salvageable items. They don’t know what else to do. Women’s shoes and broken dishes are visible, but the jewelry she seeks—worth 90,000 rupees or about $900—is not to be found.

Caught without his notebook, this reporter picks up a small rectangular piece of paper from the ground so he can write down her name. As he writes, she notices that the other side contains a faded picture, nearly washed out by the seawater. “That is my brother,” she says.

A 9.0 earthquake off the coast of Sumatra sent a tsunami speeding across the Indian Ocean on a beautiful, sunny morning after Christmas. An hour later, an estimated 30,000 Sri Lankans were dead, and thousands of homes were destroyed.

A. Fonsaka stands alone, staring silently at the calm blue waters, remembering the day when the sea raged. Fonsaka, like many Sri Lankans, initializes his surname. One’s given name is written last. His home also had been across the street. Now his broken fishing catamaran lies in two large pieces atop the flattened remains of his house. He wears a silver crucifix around his neck. He waits for someone to offer help.

A young man named Nimal, a member of a church in Galle, did not own a home, but the one he was renting washed away.

“I have no home, no clothes but these,” he says, fingering his worn knit shirt. “For the future, I have no income.” Stumbling for the words, he explains that his children can’t go to school because they no longer have the required uniforms.

North of Galle, in the fishing village of Dodanduwa, P. H. Piyarangth is eager to tell what has happened to him. He is a small, dark man with silvering hair and a gray moustache that makes him look older than his face does. In a gesture seen too often since the tsunami, he touches his fingertips to his chest, then holds his hands out, palms up, with a mournful expression. “I am a poor man,” he says. “My mother died. My house finished.”

“Come here,” he says, leading the way past two men making rafters from palm logs with a chain saw and a hand adz. Pausing amid piles of rubble and broken boats near the beach, he stops to point. “This was my mother’s house.” He says something else in Sinhalese. A bystander translates: “He said her house 300 years old.”

Piyarangth keeps walking, keeps pointing at mounds of debris punctuated by an occasional wall.

“This was my brother’s house.” Three walls of a single room remain. “This was my house.” He has stacked salvageable blocks and roofing tiles from the tangled remains. “This was my small brother’s house.” Closer to the ocean, there is no sign of where his younger brother lived.

His mother was washed out to sea when the tsunami came, he says. She could not run fast enough. Piyarangth found her body on the beach. She was one of nine from the village who died. Two were never found.

Piyarangth’s fishing catamaran lies just inland of the beach, broken into several pieces. He survived because of his experience with the sea, he said. As a fisherman, he recognized that the water level was dropping quickly, three hours before the expected low tide. Sensing trouble, he ran to get his family and take them to high ground where they “climbed up in a big house” and escaped the first giant wave.

He watched as the second wave covered his house. The third wave flattened its walls of cinderblocks and mortar.

It took almost 30 minutes for the water to recede after the last wave, and then bubbles kept popping from the ground, he said, mimicking the sound. “People were afraid the waves would come back.”

Further down the beach, a beloved puppy almost cost Asaththamby Weelu and his son their lives. When the first wave came, Weelu shouted so loudly that blood came from his mouth, he says. Weelu and his wife, Lakshumi Aryunan, took their children toward high ground. Remembering that they had left a puppy in the house, Weelu and the boy ran back to get it, and were caught in the second wave. Weelu put his son on his shoulders and they both held onto a concrete light pole until the waters receded enough that they could move inland. The puppy was saved.

Now, more than two weeks later, they sleep each night with relatives in Galle. During the day, they return to Dodanduwa and work at cleaning away the fragments of their former home.

Sarath Weerararttha is a tourist guide, proud that he speaks English and German as well as his native Tamil. “My house is finished,” he says. “My mother’s house is flat.” He points to an area that could have been bombed. “We are staying in the temple,” he says. He points to a small area where 26 houses once stood. They are no more.

Word has come from the Sri Lankan government that houses will no longer be built within 300 meters of the sea, leaving the newly homeless to wonder what they will do. They own no other land except what is in their village.

As a guide, Weerararttha is knowledgeable about Dodanduwa. He says there are 15,000 residents in the area, and 190 men and boys work as fishermen, sailing their catamarans several miles offshore in search of tuna and other fish.

But, even for those whose boats survived, there is no more fishing for now. The people refuse to eat fish for fear that the fish have eaten parts of dead bodies.

A boat, broken in half by the waves, sits beneath the palm trees. Carefully painted above a smiling fish are the words: “Sea is our life.”

Posted: 1/21/05

BaptistWay Bible Series for Jan. 30

Jesus told stories that his listeners might see

Matthew 13:24-43

By Todd Still

Truett Seminary, Waco

This lesson is a continuation of Jesus’ instruction on the kingdom of heaven through the use of parables as recorded in Matthew 13. Virtually the entire chapter, which constitutes the third of five discourses in Matthew’s Gospel, is comprised of parables that stimulate reflection upon and response to the message and ministry of Jesus. Having considered interpretive issues pertaining to parables as well as the contents of 13:1-23 last week, we may direct our focus this week to 13:24-52.

Although Jesus was not the first to speak in parables, “there is no evidence of anyone prior to Jesus using parables as consistently, creatively and effectively as he did,” scholar Klyne Snodgrass asserts. Interestingly, Matthew construes Jesus’ abundant use of parables in speaking to the crowds as a fulfillment of Psalm 78:2 (vv. 34-35). In addition to the sower and the seed (vv. 3-9), Matthew records six other parables of Jesus in chapter 13.

As it happens, Matthew devotes more space to the parable of the weeds among the wheat and its explanation than he does to the other five parables combined. It seems fitting, therefore, for us to begin our overview of 13:24-53 by considering this parable and its interpretation.

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Following an explanation of the sower and the seed (vv. 18-23), Matthew sets forth the parable of the weeds among the wheat, traditionally known as the parable of the wheat and the tares (vv. 24-30). The storyline of this parable, which is intended as a comparison with the kingdom of heaven, unfolds as follows.

An anonymous sower spreads good seed in his field. Meanwhile, as he sleeps, an unnamed enemy sows weeds among the wheat. As the wheat grows, so do the tares. This prompts certain slaves to ask their master whether he had sown good seed in the first place and if so, for him to explain the presence of the tares. The master realizes a foe has done this to his field but instructs his slaves not to gather the weeds at the present time lest they also uproot the wheat. Furthermore, the master tells them to let the two intermingle until harvest, at which time he will have the harvesters collect and burn the weeds while gathering the wheat into his barn.

The interpretation of this parable set forth by Matthew renders unnecessary much speculation regarding its meaning (vv. 36-43). In response to his disciples’ request to explain the parable, Jesus offers interpretive light. He likens the sower of the good seed to the Son of Man and identifies the devil as the one who sowed the tares. Additionally, he compares the field to the world and earmarks the wheat as children of the kingdom and the weeds as offspring of the evil one. Lastly, Jesus speaks of the harvest as the end of the age and of the reapers as angels.

Commenting further upon the fate of the weeds, Jesus declares they will meet their demise at the final judgment. Commissioned angels will separate the wheat from the weeds, and whereas the latter will face grisly judgment for their sins, the former, who are regarded as righteous, will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father.

Matthew employs Jesus’ parable of the net to reinforce this message (vv. 47-50). Even as one who fishes with a drag net must differentiate between “keepers” and “non-keepers,” divinely sent messengers will discriminate between the “evil” and the “righteous” at the end of the age. Although interpreters of parables must make allowances for figurative speech, it would be exegetically inaccurate and theologically imprudent to excise from these two parables the reality of divine judgment predicated upon one’s response to the kingdom of God made manifest in Jesus the Messiah.

The four remaining parables in Matthew 13 may be treated in pairs. In 13:31-33, Matthew records two of Jesus’ parables where he likens the kingdom of heaven to a mustard seed on the one hand and to leaven on the other.

Like the parables of the sower and the weeds, the mustard seed parable features a sower, a field and, of course, seed. Unlike these parables, however, the parable of the mustard seed draws attention to the size of the seed. Although botanists now say the mustard seed is not actually the smallest of all seeds, the precise size of the seed is not the intended point of the parable. Rather, the size of the mustard seed relative to the size of mustard plant is analogous to the inconspicuous beginnings of the kingdom and its subsequent, burgeoning growth.

If the mustard seed is miniscule, leaven is invisible. Be that as it may, a little leaven can cause a whole lot of flour to rise. The three measures of flour referred to in verse 33 is roughly equivalent to 50 pounds of flour, enough for one hundred loaves of bread. It is atypical for biblical writers to employ leaven as a positive metaphor. While Jesus’ use of it to depict the kingdom of heaven may underscore its usefulness as a rising agent, by using this image he also may be alluding to the world’s disregard for those people of no repute (like children) or of ill-repute (like harlots and toll collectors) who comprise the kingdom of God.

The parables of the hidden treasure and the pearl are more accessible (vv. 44-45). In both instances, these similitudes suggest the kingdom of heaven being inaugurated through Jesus’ person and mission is of great worth. So much so, that it is worth sacrificing anything and everything to attain it. Such abandonment for the sake of the kingdom results in joy and fulfillment. Discernment of what God has done and is doing in Jesus Christ is a treasure trove filled with riches new and old, riches both for now and forevermore. Amen.

Discussion questions

• Does the use of leaven in Jesus’ parable call to mind the importance of someone you may have written off as not worth your time?

• What are you willing to sacrifice to inherit the kingdom of God?

Posted: 2/01/05

BaptistWay Bible Series for Feb. 6

Believers are to come with a childlike faith

Matthew 18:1-14

By Todd Still

Truett Seminary, Waco

Thus far in this series of lessons on the discourses of Jesus in Matthew's Gospel, we have examined the sermon on the mount (chapters 5-7), the missionary discourse (chapter 10) and various parables regarding the kingdom of heaven (chapter 13). A thread woven throughout is the character of the kingdom of heaven as proclaimed and incarnated by Jesus and his disciples.

The theme of the kingdom of heaven also features in chapter 18 (vv. 1, 3, 4, 23), the fourth of five discourses recorded by Matthew. In this week's lesson, the first of two focusing upon the contents of chapter 18, Jesus likens the kingdom of heaven to a little child (18:2-5) and calls his followers to care for the “little ones” (18:6, 10, 14).

Matthew's record of Jesus' teaching regarding what constitutes greatness in the kingdom and how believers are to interact one with another in the church commences with a question. Following a curious conversation between Peter and Jesus concerning the temple tax (17:24-27), Matthew reports that the disciples approach Jesus and ask him about greatness in the kingdom of heaven (18:1). Mark and Luke indicate the Twelve had occasion to discuss among themselves which of them was the greatest (Mark 9:34; Luke 9:46).

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Along similar lines, in Matthew 20:20-21, the mother of James and John enjoins Jesus to arrange special seats for her sons on either side of himself in the kingdom. Mark reports the sons of Zebedee themselves had the audacity to ask Jesus directly for special heavenly seating assignments (10:35-37).

Differences in minor details between the synoptic accounts notwithstanding, it must have been much to the shock and chagrin of the status-seeking disciples that Jesus would appeal to children as paradigmatic and constitutive of the kingdom. So radical and revolutionary was Jesus' kingdom vision, he had to reiterate to the Twelve that the kingdom of heaven is comprised of children (Matthew 19:13-14).

Along with women, children frequently were undervalued and mistreated in the world in which Jesus lived. They had no status and were comparatively helpless. In short, they were powerless and depended upon their elders, particularly their fathers, for their well-being. Even as Jesus is a different kind of king (a king who enters into Jerusalem on a borrowed burrow and dies the death of a criminal), he reigns over a different kind of kingdom

According to Matthew 18:2, Jesus offered his disciples a tangible illustration of his instruction regarding greatness in the kingdom of heaven by taking and placing a child in the middle of them. Having done so, he tutors his disciples in kingdom matters by earnestly enjoining (note “Truly I say to you…”) them to recognize that unless they turn and become as children (that is, powerless and dependent) then they will never ever enter the kingdom of heaven (18:3). Moreover, he explicitly answers their question regarding greatness in the kingdom by declaring the greatest person in the kingdom of heaven is the one who humbles oneself like the child in their midst (18:4). Furthermore, Jesus informs his followers that whoever receives a child in his name receives Jesus himself (18:5; 25:40).

At 18:6, Jesus shifts from speaking about literal children to spiritual “little ones” (vv. 6, 10, 14). Earlier in Matthew, those on mission for Jesus were depicted as “little ones” (10:42). Here, “little ones” appear to describe disciples who are for whatever reason(s) spiritually (and culturally?) vulnerable. These believers may be similar to the “weak” of whom Paul speaks in 1 Corinthians (8:7, 9-12) and Romans (14:1-2; 15:1). Even as Paul cautions the Romans (14:13, 21) and the Corinthians (8:9) not to become a stumbling block for a weaker Christian, Jesus declares that whoever might cause a little one to stumble would be better off with a large millstone hung around his or her neck and drowned in the depth of the sea (18:6).

A millstone is a large, circular stone driven by a donkey and used for grinding grain. I will never forget being taken aback by the sheer size of a millstone when I first had the occasion to see one in Capernaum five years ago.

Two “woes” follow the stark warning in 18:6–a woe to the world and a woe to the one who causes a “little one” to stumble (18:7). In biblical literature, a “woe” tends to introduce a prophetic oracle of lament or condemnation. Here, one can detect an admixture of doom and pity. Although stumbling blocks invariably will arise (because of the fallen state of humanity), this serves as no consolation to either the cosmos or the one who gives offense. The person who compromises the faith of a “little one” is subject to divine chastisement, and there are cosmic repercussions of human disobedience to God as the world is further reinforced and ensnarled in its sinful, sin-filled state (Romans 8:18-25). Auditors of the first Gospel would probably have regarded Judas as a woeful individual (26:24).

Believers should see themselves as vulnerable and susceptible to sin to the extent they are willing to take extreme precautions to protect both themselves and others from stumbling, that is, falling away from the faith (18:8-9; 5:29-30). We would do well to pray with regularity: “Prone to wander, Lord I feel it; prone to leave the God I love; Here's my heart, Lord, take it, seal it; seal it for thy courts above.”

Disciples are not to cause “little ones” to stumble, nor are they to look down upon them. If angels who continually gaze at God care about and advocate for them, how much more so should mere mortals (15:10). Each and every “little one” is of great value to God, even as each and every sheep is of tremendous worth to a shepherd. It is not sufficient for a good shepherd to be satisfied with the loss of a single sheep. Rather, a shepherd who cares for his flock seeks out a lost sheep and rejoices greatly upon finding it (18:12-13).

If we would feign to work with God, then we will recognize that the Lord values all people, be they lost, little or numbered among the 99. It is not the Father's will that a single “little one” be lost. Neither should it be our desire. “I love thee, I love thee, I love thee, I know; just how much I love thee my actions will show.”

Discussion questions

What does it mean to come to Christ with a childlike faith?

What characteristics seem to come naturally to children that people seem to lose as they age?