Selling Water by the River with Shane Hipps
Aug.26, 2013 in
Guest Appearances, Podcast Episodes
In this episode Shane Hipps joins Ray for a conversation about his book Selling Water by the River: A Book About the Life Jesus Promised and the Religion That Gets in the Way. Why is it that Christians feel we have the corner on God? Why do we protect the Kingdom like a guard instead of tending to it like a gardener? Join us as Shane shares his thoughts about church, life, the Spirit of Christ, and more. Make sure to check out Shane’s book Selling Water by the River: A Book About the Life Jesus Promised and the Religion That Gets in the Way, and visit his website at www.shanehipps.com. Thanks for taking the time to join the dialog Shane!
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September 9th, 2014 at 9:24 am
“Christianity’s exclusive grip on Christ” seems like a nebulous way of stating that Jesus might not want to be a part of his Christian church. The former quote suggests that the Jew may also find a different path to God than Jesus (after all to the Jew he is a stumbling block and false messiah). So are there many paths? Secondly you make the analogy of a parents love being limitless. Indeed that is true but analogous to what? God’s love for everyone. I’m not a Calvinist and so am able to take passages about God loving all the world at face value. But your analogy seems to be suggesting a relation to multi paths to God. If this is the case the apology fails as there is no reason for the apostles to go share their way to get to God. It seems all missionary efforts are poorly conceived on the many-paths hypothesis. Don’t even get me started on dying for what the apostles mistakingly thought was “the one way”! As Paul pointed out, if their claims of the gospels are not true then they are the biggest fools!
You mention an expansion over time. Indeed but not without clear boundaries. The idea that we all have glasses that we can’t get out from behind. Cultural context as it were. But this is why we engage in hermeneutics. To understand what the Jewish culture of 1st century Palestine would have understood Jesus to say. We try and understand how first century Jewish quotes of history and religious commentary would have written from a style standpoint. We ask if they felt free to rearrange event to highlight certain themes? Would they have memorized significant oral teachings? Etc.
Post Modernism states, “There is no meaning in the text!” Lyotard famously stated that we should find all metanarratives to be unbelievable. Christian view of a personal, triune God working out his purposes in human history is a meta-narrative. Perhaps there is no meaning in Lyotard’s text?
Jesus centered lens. Shma in Dueteronmy 6:4 was known to be superior to all. It still is to my Jewish friends who reject Jesus. Your destruction of Canon seems selfdestructive! Jesus had a high view of scripture and not as you seem to suppose a growth that makes the OT invalid for Jesus as the NT is invalid for us.
Just because we see new gems in scripture revealed by a personal Jesus only goes to abrogate against the Fundamnetalist Bible deism where Jesus can’t speak to us today. Except through the scriptures. It doesn’t lead us to believe that everyone will get something different from the bible and it is all equally true.
Connecting with God is a great theme. Being open and honest and transparent are great traits. But their is a baby in the bath water. We may think that Fundamentalisms argument from authority is fallacious.
Belief is not epistemology. We know nothing through belief. You seem to define a priori, or propositional knowledge, as belief and a posteriori, or experiential knowledge as knowing.
The need to cast away apologetics seems fallacous. Just because the Enlightment was focused on the need to explain everything through science (including explaining away God) doesn’t mean that humans are no longer rational beings. You assume their rationality when you make a defense in your book for your views. You engage in an apologetic for your views in this interview and yet state how wrong-headed apologetics are. You are giving us a menu that say that the menu is irrelevant.
The message of hearing and experiencing Christ every day is a great one. It is largely lost in our Evangelical churches. Many of my friends ask me for help here stating, “I have never experienced Jesus once in x number of years of being a Christian!” There are many paths to hearing Jesus but destroying people’s understanding of epistemology; confusing them about Jesus’ high view of the scriptures, communicating in such a way that there is no understanding of what meta narrative e Bible is conveying is potentially going to cause people to discard your ideas. These thing are not needed.
Hearing from Jesus is.
“Distracted by the surface of belief.” Meditating on the atonement, Jesus’ coming to take on the sins of the world, has transported me to place of great humility. That meditation has led to hearing very specifically from God. I have led many to deeper understanding and hearing through confession of sin exposed by the Gospel and Holy Spirit.
Maybe your communication style is what bothers me.” Love is light.” “Freedom of choice is love” filled with bumper-sticker theology just like many of our Gurus on PBS. If you adopt the vernacular of pop gurus you will have trouble reaching Conservatives.
Your comments about fear in the conservative church is a straw man. It is an over-generalization which can be claimed of any group without warrant. “Liberal and post moderns are in fear of not being relevant to culture and not fitting in” “emergents are afraid of not being innovative”, see how easy it is to cast aspersions.
Your points on where the church bounds its members is best understood in Heibert’s paper on bounded vs center sets.
Jesus told people to follow him! His disciples pointed to Jesus. We live Jesus and when people ask we tell them and point them to Jesus.
The bible doesn’t say the spirit of Christ is in bhudha? Vishnu? That is scary. You just got off the bus. Have you not read of a deceiver. God reveals himself through the Holy Spirit directly and through ose who are committed to his work. Not through humanity! Wow that is patently false.
Heretical. Chew on that.