Wednesday, June 20, 2007

Errant

How lovely your dwellings, O LORD of Hosts

Errant means exactly what I said - It is directly supported from the Scripture of course.

Some seem to be having trouble understanding what I have written. I regret that I have written with words that cannot be understood. I do want to be understood. I am an ordinary man. Sometimes I cannot say what I mean. Sometimes I mistype a word like untimate - ultimate or intimate? Sometimes my impeccable grammar enshrines a doorless thought.

With respect to God and logic though, there is a simple rule. God cannot, by definition, be included in a logical statement that is subject to the usual constraints on objects in the world because God is not an object in the world. Corrolary: all things that are objects in the world including our favorite things like logic, canon, inerrant, sentences containing statements that we consider absolutes (except wodka of course - in deference to some of my Russian friends), are not God.

Foolishness aside, this rule with regard to logic applies equally well to the Law. God is not subject to Law. Neither is grace. Fairness is undecidable. But God allows himself to be found and the finding is poetry, music, and more. It is that word that seems to repeat in the Psalms: completion. It is that experience that is reflected in the perpetual sacrifice בְּתָמִים. This word is sometimes translated 'upright' but that does not reflect its purpose in life. If one word had to describe the NT it would be completion - tetelestai. It is the fait accompli - the work of God that had to be done, that created the worlds, and which says a complete word about our God.

This is the wind that is errant, that goes where it pleases, that saves gay or straight, Muslim or Christian, Jew or Gentile, male and female, the ultimate fare.

Of course, it is possible that I am in the ewilderness.

1 comment:

Tim Bulkeley said...

I just spotted this post. I love it! Errancy is so what Scripture is about, God's journeying with erring people. Unlike Mike, if I have to choose between straight tight confinement in inerrancy and the wondrous delight of the errant Spirit, I'll choose errant every time!