25 October 2015

Always Reforming



Reformation Wall, Geneva, Switzerland
2 Corinthians 5:16-6:10

Reformation Sunday
25th October 2015

Sola scriptura.  Sola gratia.  Sola fide. Solus Christus.  Soli Deo gloria. These are the Five Solae, five Latin phrases that together sum up the core theological vision of the Protestant Reformation.  Scripture alone.  Grace alone. Faith alone.  Christ alone.  Glory to God alone.  The pillars of the Reformation.  They represent the broad theological tenets that emerged throughout the Church’s Reformation in the early sixteenth century.  Each one is a counter claim, that is, a rejection of prevailing theological views of the Roman Catholic Church at the time.  Scripture alone has authority, not tradition.  Grace, faith, alone, not works righteousness.  Christ, not the Pope.  God’s glory, not the glory of the Church or the glory of humanity.  These were the beliefs that rocked and then split the Church in the early 1500s, unleashing a movement of reform that the Church had never witnessed before or since.

Today, as Presbyterians, as a people reformed, we are heirs of this movement.  On the 31st October 1517, in Wittenberg, Germany, when Martin Luther (1483-1536) posted ninety-five reasons why the Church should not be involved in the sale of indulgences, he never dreamed we would be remembering him these many years later. Indulgences were basically certificates one could buy to release a loved one from the confines of purgatory. One of the indulgence sellers, Johann Tetzel (1465-1519) even came up with a little jingle:  “When the coin in the copper rings, the soul from purgatory springs.”  The proceeds were used to build St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. When Luther protested the sale of indulgences, he didn’t anticipate centuries later we would be honoring his act of conscience.  

On Reformation Sunday, the Sunday closest to the 31st October, Protestants around the world celebrate and remember the reformers: Luther in Germany, Jean Cauvin (1509-1564) in Geneva, Ülrich Zwingli (1484-1531) and Heinrich Bullinger (1504-1574) in Zurich, John Knox (c. 1514-1572) in St. Andrews and Edinburgh, Scotland—we remember their passion, their commitment, their courage, their love for the gospel and need to reform the church.

If I could give you a walking tour of St. Andrews, I would take you to two places in particular.  I would shoud you to the ruin of the bishop’s castle and invite you to look down at the pavement and see two letters: GW. And then I would take you to St. Salvator’s, the University Chapel.  In the cobbles outside the chapel are two letters: PH.  These are the initials of two men, George Wishart (1513-1546) and Patrick Hamilton (1504-1528), who were burned at the stake for their reforming ideas. 

One of my favorite places in St. Andrews is the hill situated along the North Sea where the Martyrs Monument stands. Inscribed on it are the names of the reformers who died for their faith in St. Andrews. Whenever I’m back there I always make a point of going to the monument.  I find a bench and reflect on their witness.  I think of their courage, their dedication to the gospel of Jesus Christ, what they experienced, their commitment to these beliefs—sola scriptura, sola gatia, sola fide, solus Christos, soli Deo gloria—and I ask could I, would I do the same? Would you? Could you?

In 2017 we will mark the 500th anniversary of the Reformation.  Almost five hundred years on, the spirit of reform is still alive, particularly in China and many nations in Africa.  But, to be honest, in the West, it’s losing steam.  I’ve been to Geneva, the city of Calvin, twice.  The Protestant ethos is there in the people and the architecture, but the churches are empty, which is true for most places in Europe.  Iain Torrance, who preached in this pulpit several years ago, former president of Princeton Seminary, former moderator of the Church of Scotland, and now professor at New College, Edinburgh, said several years ago that Reformed Christianity (the heirs of Calvin) has lost its way. We have lost our vision.

For several years now I’ve felt that something is seriously wrong with the Reformed tradition.  It’s been difficult to put a finger on it.  It’s more a sense, an intuition that something is missing.  Personally, to be completely honest, I’ve come to feel that Christianity is in trouble. Yes, there are healthy and vibrant churches.  I give thanks to God for churches such as this one, and many others like it, churches that are vital, engaged, and alive.  I don’t want to be pessimistic or negative, but you need to know that what we have here at CPC isn’t the norm.  So many churches are struggling to survive, many are plagued by conflict (just ask a presbytery executive or a Committee on Ministry chairperson), many have lost their focus, burnout rates among pastors are very high, and seminaries are struggling as enrollment continues to decline. 

Several years ago, Dorothy Boulton returned from a visit to London.  She spent a day visiting Oxford and showed me a photo of a sign situated at the entrance to the chapel of Christ Church College.  It reads: “What is the church?”  The sign provides a description of Christian worship and beliefs.  Now, think about this for a minute.  You don’t have to explain what a church is if people already know.  And you don’t have to explain what goes on in church if people are actually going to church, if they’re part of a church.  The sign is itself a symbol, a symbol that points to the deeper, pervasive reality that the Church is becoming (has already become?) a relic from another time. 

I’m not trying to be negative or pessimistic. Believe me.  What the Church needs, however, is a healthy dose of realism.  So what do we do?  We can celebrate our past, I guess.  We can commemorate the Reformation, reaffirm our beliefs—teach our children well—remember what makes us Protestants. 

There was a time when I thought knowing what we believe and why was enough. There was a time when I thought getting the ideas right, getting the theology right was the cure for what ails the Church.  After twenty-five years of ministry, I’m not so sure.  Don’t get me wrong, ideas matter, theology matters.  As we know, there’s a lot of loopy theology out there in the Church these days. 

What I’ve come to know is this: Tending belief is high maintenance.  Beliefs require verification, right? And then proof, right? And argument. And then they require protection, right?  We have to defend them.  Welcome to the belligerent world of beliefs!  What I’ve found in the belligerent world of beliefs is that often the beliefs we fight about have very little to do with the reality of God.  Instead, we’re often dealing with embattled egos, beliefs as extensions of frightened egos, beliefs used as weapons by frightened egos against people who appear threatening.  All of this has absolutely nothing to do with the gospel of Jesus Christ.

The world has grown tired of beliefs.  The world knows the costly price of dogmatic assertions and fundamentalisms of every kind.  And the world has lost faith, is quickly losing faith in what the Church believes because the Church has failed to truly embody it—incarnate it, enflesh it—in its practice.

I, too, have grown tired, very tired of beliefs.  Sounds odd coming from a preacher, right?  That’s how I feel.

The first Jesus followers did not have a belief system.  Jesus called people to follow him, which meant more than believing in him, more than simply confessing certain theological ideas about him, and certainly more than an anemic ethical do-goodism (which often passes as “Christian” these days). The first followers of Christ had an experience of the holy; they had an encounter with the divine; they participated in the power and grace and intensity of God’s Spirit unleashed upon the world in a new way, gospeling creation in the flesh, in a person, in Jesus Christ, who calls humanity to embark, like him, on a heroic journey of divine dimensions and cosmic proportions! That was the Apostle Paul’s experience too.  Whatever Paul came to believe about Christ was first experienced in and with and through Christ and what he continued to experience through the Spirit.

These are the rich, theological claims we find in 2 Corinthians.  This is Paul at his finest, with soaring rhetoric and sublime theology.  “So, if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation; everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and has given us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us” (2 Cor. 5:17-19).

Let’s go deeper into this text.  We can dissect this text, isolate its theological claims, all the beliefs of the church: new creation, reconciliation, ministry.  We can go deeper and say something about God’s relationship with Christ, Christ’s relationship with God, something about the doctrine of atonement, how God dealt with sin.  Implied here, too, is Paul’s understanding of the cross, salvation, and resurrection.  All of this (and more!) is going on in 5:16-21.  We can “mine” these verses for their theological claims, come up with a list of what one might believe about the faith.  To only approach the text this way misses the point.  It misses what’s behind these theological claims.  Go deeper still to what’s behind the text, which is Paul’s own life-experience, what he came to know through his own encounter with the Risen Christ.  And this encounter didn’t happen once but again and again throughout his life.  

Hear again verse 21, “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”  Did you hear that?  “…that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”  And now listen again to 6:1, “As we work together with him, we urge you also not to accept the grace of God in vain.”  Did you hear that?    “...As we work together with him, we urge you …not to accept the grace of God in vain.”  And then Paul continues to talk about the nature of his ministry, a life that flows from an experience of God’s grace, not from trust in ideas or beliefs.  His wasn’t a ministry of defending ideas or beliefs, but one urged on by the love of Christ.  It’s a life, a ministry that, right now, participates in the presence of the Risen Christ, who enabled Paul to undergo “great endurance, in afflictions, hardships, calamities, beatings, imprisonments, riots, labors, sleepless nights, hunger: by purity, knowledge, patience, kindness, holiness of spirit, genuine love, truthful speech, and the power of God” (2 Cor. 6:4-7).  And I should note that “knowledge” here is not “theoretical understanding of theological propositions” but a deep, personal awareness of what Paul is being called to do.[1]

The Reformed tradition has never been comfortable with personal experience. We prefer our rational, theological systems; we prefer to think our way to faith.  We are a people of creeds and confessions.  Don’t get me wrong: there’s a place for all of these.  But if beliefs hinder us from actually experiencing the grace we say, as Protestants, actually saves, then something is missing, something is terribly, seriously wrong.  Even Calvin, known for his methodical, systematic thinking, developed as his personal symbol the image of an upturned hand, an open palm holding a heart with a flame above it: a heart set on fire offered up to God, “Promptly and Sincerely.”[2] Even Calvin, Mr. Cerebral Theologian that he was, knew that unless the gospel is inwardly digested, made real in hearts, as well as minds, the gospel remains at a distance from us, far away.  

The gospel needs to penetrate the psyche, become part of who we are, shape how we see the world; it needs to be embodied in our lives.  Without this our theological beliefs are just crafty cerebrations that do little to transform lives. And if our lives aren’t transformed, if we ourselves aren’t reforming and always being reformed by the Spirit of God, then how on earth can we be expected to help reform the world?

That’s why these days I’m reading less theology and more psychology, specifically the work of the Swiss psychiatrist Carl G. Jung (1875-1961).  If you’ve noticed, I’ve referred to him a lot over the last eight years.  I’m slowly starting to write a book on Jung and Christian experience.  But this isn’t an academic exercise for me.  I believe that Jung has a lot to offer the contemporary Church; he has a lot to say about how we view Christian experience. 

Jung was truly one of the seminal geniuses of the twentieth century. One reason he’s so relevant to us is because he himself was a child of the manse.  His father was a Reformed pastor. Carl came from a long line of Reformed pastors and professors.  Carl learned the catechism from his father; he read widely from his father’s library, he was confirmed in the church. But when he first partook of Communion as an adolescent, he said it was a lifeless experience, both for him and seemingly everyone else sitting around him.  Jung knew that his father was depressed, and he lost the zeal of his faith.  His father knew the creeds, knew the beliefs of the church, regurgitated them in sermons week after week, but they didn’t touch the depths of his soul. Carl, himself, had profound religious experiences as a child.  He always had a fire in his belly for the divine.  Jung eventually collaborated with Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) in the emerging field of psychoanalysis, but in the end it was the question of religion, the experience of the holy, the numinous, that led to their painful break.  Freud wanted nothing to do with religion (he saw it as a source of neurosis); for Jung, the psyche was and is essentially religious.[3]

C. G. Jung in his study in Kusnacht, near Zurich.
The last thirty years of Jung’s life were spent exploring the psychological aspects of Christianity.  He was very critical of theologians.  Jung knew then, in the 1930s, that the church was in trouble; he knew that Christianity was in trouble.  So he approached Christianity as if it were a patient in need of therapy.[4] He wanted to help heal the church, heal Christianity.  Why?  Because he saw it as the best hope for humanity.  And he wanted to help heal the Protestant soul, which he knew was sick, especially in Europe after the Second World War.  The Protestant soul is still in need of deep healing.

In a famous interview with the BBC in 1959, Jung was asked, “Dr. Jung, do you believe in God.”  After pausing for a moment, he said, “I don’t believe.  I know.”[5]  I know—knowledge rooted in experience.  Jung said, “The Churches stand for traditional and collective convictions which in the case of many of its adherents are no longer based on their own inner experience but on unreflecting belief, which is notoriously apt to disappear as soon as one begins thinking about it.”[6]  This is why Jung said that “Christian civilization has proved hollow to a terrifying degree: it is all veneer, but the inner man has remained untouched and therefore unchanged.  His soul is out of key with his external beliefs;….”[7] The strongest indictment of Christianity was the fact that so-called “Christian” Europe tore itself apart, and the world with it, in not one but two cataclysmic world wars.  “Christian education,” Jung said, “has done all that is humanly possible, but it has not been enough.  Too few people have experienced the divine image as the innermost possession of their own souls.  Christ only meets them from without, never from within the soul.”[8]

Jung insisted, “The advocates of Christianity squander their energies in the mere preservation of what had come down to them, with no thought of building on their house and making it roomier.”[9] I think Jung is right.

The Church of Jesus Christ is not a museum.  We’re not a historical preservation society.  We’re called to reformreformed by the Spirit who is calling us to a new day.  We need to become roomier, building new homes in which the human spirit can thrive.  We’re not called to preserve the past or live in the past. Christ is alive. Christ is at work within us, now. 

It’s in the soul, in the heart, in the core of our being where the reformation of God’s love and grace must be experienced in radically new ways, in order for it to be seen in the world, in order for the world to be reformed all for the glory of God. “In Christ there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!”  Reformed and always being reformed. When we experience the ongoing reforming power of God’s grace—not just believe in it, but know it, feel it, experience it—then the Church will really have something profound and meaningful and relevant to offer the world again.  

May it be so. Amen.






[1] Ernest Best, Second Corinthians-Interpretation: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Louisville:  John Knox Press, 1987), 61.
[2] Calvin’s personal motto: “I offer my heart to thee O Lord, promptly and sincerely.” (Cor Meum Tibi Offero Domine Prompte Et Sincere).
[3] See Carl G. Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections, Aniela Jaffé, editor (New York: Vintage Books, 2011).
[4] See Murray Stein, Jung’s Treatment of Christianity: The Psychotherapy of a Religious Tradition (Chiron Publications, 1986).
[5] The 1959 BBC interview on “Face to Face,” may be viewed here.
[6] C. G. Jung, “The Undiscovered Self (Present and Future),” Civilization in TransitionCollected Works of C. G. Jung 10, par. 521 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978).
[7] C. G. Jung, “Introduction to the Religious and Psychological Problems of Alchemy,” Psychology and AlchemyCollected Works of C. G. Jung 12, par. 12 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1977).
[8] C. G. Jung, CW 12, par 12.
[9] C. G. Jung, Aion: Researches into the Phenomenology of the SelfCollected Works of C. G. Jung, 9, II, par. 170 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1979).

18 October 2015

Service as Sacrament

Mark 10: 35-45

Twenty-first Sunday after Pentecost/ October 21, 2012

“A visible sign of an invisible grace.”  That’s how the great theologian Augustine of Hippo (354-430), writing in the late fourth to early fifth-century, defined a sacrament.  “A visible sign of an invisible grace.”  It’s one of the best descriptions of a sacrament.  It’s simple; so easy to remember.  I remember learning it in college.

A sacrament allows the invisible grace of God to become visible, even tangible in our lives.  A sacrament is a holy act that allows something of God to come into focus. It allows the grace of God to become more accessible to our senses and therefore more real.  We experience this in baptism and in the Lord’s Supper.  The definition works for any moment, any activity that reveals the presence and love of God. 

As we know, most Protestants affirm two sacraments, baptism and the Lord’s Supper; our Roman Catholic brothers and sisters consider five additional acts or rites as sacramental.  However, by Augustine’s definition there may be many signs that make grace visible to us.  If we were to add to the list of sacraments—I’m not suggesting that we do so, but if we did—perhaps Protestants and Roman Catholics, as well as Orthodox Christians would all agree that acts of service can also be sacramental.  Why?  Because service, when done in love, can also be a sign of God’s grace and reign in the world.  Service, when done in love and joy, can convey to the world that God is near.

This is Jesus’ point here, much to the consternation, frustration and confusion of the disciples.  He say, “…whoever wishes to be great among you must become your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave (or servant) of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many” (Mark 10:43-45).

We know these verses well.  So familiar you might have, just now, skipped reading.  They’re familiar; maybe so familiar we miss hearing the message.  They sound, well, so…Christian.  Don’t they?  Jesus as servant.  Jesus as servant of all.  Jesus as suffering servant.  We’ve heard this all before.  The Christian is called to serve. That’s what we do (or, at least, what what we’re supposed to do) we serve one another.  For some, this summarizes what it means to be Christian.  Christians do good in the world.  Christians do nice things for people.  It’s the Christian thing to do.

We need to put some caution around this, however.  Christians need to remember that Christians don’t have the market on doing good.  Actually, to be a follower of Jesus is about more than trying to be good person.  Simply doing good does not a Christian make.  And Jesus is more than a teacher of ethics.  What Jesus is saying here, what he’s expecting from his disciples requires something more than a willingness to do good.

Just before we read about James and John asking to be the teacher’s pet, their teacher tells them, “See we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be handed over to the chief priests and the scribes, and they will condemn him to death; then they will hand him over to the Gentiles; they will mock him, and spit on him, and flog him, and kill him; and after three days rise again” (10:33-34).  Then we find James and John, not paying attention, not listening—or listening, but not hearing, ignoring, denying what he said—but instead asking Jesus for a favored position when he sits in glory.  There’s only room for two, they think, one on the left and one on the right. 

You have no idea what you’re talking about.  “You don’t know what you’re saying,” Jesus says.  You really don’t know what you’re asking.  You have no idea, do you?  You have no idea what I’m about, do you? 

Sure, we do.  Pick us.  You’ll see.  We’re better than the others. 

When the others heard James and John, they became angry.  So Jesus called them all aside and said, look, “You know that among the Gentiles those whom they recognize as their rulers lord it over them, and their great ones are tyrants over them.”  

You know that among the Gentiles…  Who is Jesus talking about here?  Who are the Gentiles? Non-Jews, yes.  But who is the ruler of the Gentiles?  The Roman governor. He’s also the ruler of the Jews because the Roman Empire occupies Palestine.  You know how the Romans operate, Jesus says, they lord it over them; their rulers lord it over them, and subjugate everyone, including their “great ones,” which is probably a veiled reference here to the Emperor himself.

How does Rome act?  With brute force and power.  Those at the top have all the power; those at the bottom have none.  Those on the bottom only exist to serve those on the top.  Those without power are destined to serve those with power—and those at the bottom are powerless to do anything about it.  Those who have more honor, more glory, more power expect to be served by those with less, by those who are beneath them.  That is the Roman way, everywhere Rome rules

But it’s just not the Roman way.  There’s something oddly familiar about all this, isn’t there?  It reflects a very human way, a fallen, sinful way, the way of false ambition and the almost Darwinian struggle to be on top of the heap, to be the best, to have the place of honor, the recognition of the crowd, the glory.  If we’re honest, there’s something of James and John in each of us.  We each have our ego needs and we look to look to wealth, power, influence, rank, position, achievements, authority, honor, glory, and status to help meet our ego needs, to prop us up.  To be clear, these are not inherently bad, but they can easily become hurtful and destructive, petty and small, ugly and dishonoring, toxic, even evil if all we’re worrying about is our ego needs, if we’re only worrying about ourselves, if we use people and power and privilege—and yes, even religion (!)—to get ahead in the world.  

“But it is not so among you,” Jesus says.

One of the wisest and honest writers I know is Parker Palmer, a Quaker, an educator, philosopher.  I’ve never met him, but my sense is that he’s a truly humane human being.  Early in his career he was offered the presidency of a small educational institution.  He wanted the job, and he thought he should take it.  He gathered a half-dozen trusted friends and formed what’s called in the Quaker tradition a “clearness committee.” A clearness committee helps one discern what the Quakers call way, helps one determine whether way is clear or closed.  They gathered around him, not to offer advice, but to ask honest, open-ended questions of Palmer to help him discern the call. 

Halfway through this three-hour meeting a friend asked Palmer what he would like most about being president.  He mentioned several things he wouldn’t enjoy, like wearing a tie.  But one friend said, you’re not answering the question.  Palmer says he then “gave an answer that appalled even me as I spoke it:  ‘Well,’ I said, in the smallest voice I possess, ‘I guess what I’d like most is getting my picture in the paper with the word ‘president’ under it.’”  Palmer shares, “I was sitting with seasoned Quakers who knew that though my answer was laughable, my mortal soul was clearly at stake!  They did not laugh at all but went into a long and serious silence—a silence in which I could only sweat and inwardly grown.  Finally, my questioner broke the silence with a question that cracked all of us up—and cracked me open: ‘Parker, can you think of an easier way to get your picture in the paper?’  By then it was obvious, even to me, that my desire to be president had much more to do with my ego than with the ecology of my life.”[1] That moment of clarity led him to withdraw his name from the search.

 “But it is not so among you….” 

 When Jesus offers these words he’s leading his disciples down an entirely different path.  It’s not the way our selfish, fearful egos usually want to go.  It’s not the way that comes naturally to us.  And it’s certainly not the way one chooses to go if one’s ego is fragile and insecure, when it’s full of worry and anxiety, when the ego “dominates, exploits, and manipulates others for its own advantage.”[2]

 But it is not so among you….”

Whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be servant or slave of all.  Jesus is talking about mutual servant-hood here, one serves the other, seeks to serve the other, does not seek to “lord it over” the other.  Equal to equal.

But how?  How does this happen?  It sounds impossible, given human nature.  It cuts against the grain of so much of who we are.  Is Jesus setting up an impossible standard for us to achieve?  I don’t think so.  That would be cruel.  That wouldn’t be loving, would it? 

Jesus didn’t have to grab for glory or wealth or power or authority or status in order to affirm who he was.  He knew who he was.  In the absolute best sense of the phrase, Jesus was truly full of himself, that is, clear about his identity and purpose.  And it’s from that state of fullness, of completion, knowing that he was participating in the love and generosity of God that he was then  free—not compelled, but free—to serve and to give. 

I believe that the way of Jesus is available to us through him.  From Jesus’ perspective, “only the strongest sense of self, a self that neither grovels nor grasps, can resist chasing counterfeit notions of greatness.”[3]  When we have a strong sense of self, of who we really are children of God, who we are at the core of our being, deeper than our egos, when we have awareness of who we are in all of our fullness as children of God, then we are free to serve and give in a new way, we are even free to give ourselves away.

When we serve and give in this way—when we see it happening toward others, when we’re the ones doing it, when we’re the ones receiving this kind of generosity—it becomes and looks and feels sacramental.  There’s something holy and good about it.  Something of God is present in those moments because that is the way God is, that’s how it’s done.  And, I believe, it’s possible for us to live and serve this way, not by our own will and determination alone, but when we know who we are, when our identity is firmly grounded in the One who created us, loves us, redeems us, and empowers us to act.

Whether we’re putting together Safe Motherhood Kits for IMA World Health, sharing a meal at the Cold Weather Shelter, collecting food for CEFM, walking in a CROP Walk, engaging in advocacy, working for justice and fairness, making the world safe for our children, baking and selling cookies for the Santi School in Nepal, sitting beside someone who is scared, lending an open ear and an open heart, or giving space and time to the things and people that really matter, we’re not just doing “good works" or “charity.”  We are serving.  On November 8 we get to give thanks to all of our mission partners at the Mission Fair.  Today, after worship, the first time in the history of this church, Session will receive the recommendations of the Envision Fund Board.  We will award, if the way be clear, more than $40,000 in grants to new projects and ministries, serving the needs of this community and other communities in the world. 

Serving.  Serving in a variety of ways.  When we do all of this—as well as all the other countless ways that we serve one another—in love, because of the One who loves us, then service becomes a sacrament.  It’s a holy moment.  This work is holy.  Holy!  In those moments we know that God is at work in us and through us.  In those moments we know that God is near.  Visible signs of an invisible grace.






[1] Parker Palmer, Let Your Life Speak (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1999), 44-46.  I’m relying on Daniel D. Clendenin’s helpful summary of Palmer’s account found on his website Journey with Jesus: http://journeywithjesus.net/Essays/20121015JJ.shtml.
[3] Clendenin makes this point here, http://journeywithjesus.net/Essays/20121015JJ.shtml.