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<\/a><\/p>\nLecture given in 1985<\/p>\n
Who is this person? Whom do you mean? I suppose he is the person in the street, the ordinary person.\u00a0 If so this is nothing new. We have had this before. Nothing new, but theologians and ministers are also ordinary persons.\u00a0 Perhaps it would do no harm to repeat. To some extent we must. But we must try to look at the matter freshly.\u00a0 How?<\/p>\n
Let us emphasize the word \u2018citizen\u2019 He is not a P.M. or even an M.P. but he is a member of the state and concerned about its affairs, as more or less we all are. Let us see things through his eyes.\u00a0 But first a warning. Too often this has been done in the wrong way. The Cross does not begin with a message to society. We can only have a Christian society by having Christians. The individual is offered something by the Cross. He loved\u00a0me.\u00a0<\/em>This is the place to begin. A society of Christians would not\u00a0 automatically be perfect; it would need brains, organization etc. But it would have gone a long way. We will return to this.\u00a0 But to proceed\u2014<\/p>\nJohn Citizen knows whom he has to deal with; apart from Jesus, the only name in the Creed.\u00a0 Who is the person the man has to deal with? A word perhaps on the Roman provincial system? Note the proconsul\u2019s responsibility\u2013 management of a province (cf. Petronius and Caligula). And his problem\u2014 he has 1,000 troops and 2,000,000 pilgrims. How do you keep order? Is one injustice a good price to pay for saving thousands of lives. What would you do? Radio for reinforcement? But the proconsul can\u2019t.\u00a0 Are we fair to the police in South Africa?\u00a0 The point is that while the proconsul might not be a very nice man he represents law and order not tyranny, not Hitler but the local bobby.\u00a0 More than that, as Jesus himself suggests, he has God given authority (Jn. 19.11 cf. Rom. 13).\u00a0 Here in fact is the real indictment of humankind and its problem. Rom. 13.1-7. If we are to have a state, a city there must be a sword.\u00a0 That means there must be sin. We are all guilty persons.<\/p>\n
So we learn that the first thing the Cross deals with is guilt.\u00a0 The first, but not the only thing. This opens the way to renewal. Christian life is forgiven life, because of love, God\u2019s love. Further the proconsul has his religious civil service on whose advice he acts, and it was up to a point conscientious. And they were defending a very good religion. This was their responsibility. In the discharging of it they too become guilty.\u00a0 So John Citizen will look, and he does, critically at both politics and religion. But this doesn\u2019t mean he can opt out of either. Both claim him. So none of us have clean hands.\u00a0 And this is where we return to the beginning.<\/p>\n
The Cross\u2013 it takes away guilt. \u2018Be of sin the double cure, cleanse us from its guilt\u2019 That is the Cross takes us out of the wounds so we can heal (though they may still be painful\u2013 the iodine itself can hurt). And a community of 100% Christians could have problems, and often get them wrong. But we now go further.\u00a0 Cleanse us from its guilt\u00a0and power.<\/strong> This is where another address can begin But the crux of the matter is that I John Citizen know that other persons, even enemies, are those for whom Christ died.\u00a0 And that determines the way I live.<\/p>\n\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Lecture given in 1985 Who is this person? Whom do you mean? I suppose he is the person in the street, the ordinary person.\u00a0 If so this is nothing new. We have had this before. Nothing new, but theologians and ministers are also ordinary persons.\u00a0 Perhaps it would do no harm to repeat. To some […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":91,"featured_media":62478,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[14295],"class_list":["post-62625","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-public-theology"],"yoast_head":"\n
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