Countermanding the very Words of God - revised

Countermanding the Very Words of God:

Biblical Guidance for the Church

in its Ministry to People with Sexual and Gender Irregularities

By John McLarty

Sometimes, to do right we must countermand the very words of God. This sounds blasphemous, but it is plainly taught in the Bible.

Example one: Jesus in Matthew 5

Jesus declares, “It has been said, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ “But I say to you that whoever divorces his wife for any reason except sexual immorality causes her to commit adultery; and whoever marries a woman who is divorced commits adultery.” So Jesus supersedes the words of God in Deuteronomy 24:1 with his own dictum.

“Again you have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform your oaths to the Lord.’ “But I say to you, do not swear at all . . .“But let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No,’ ‘No.’ For whatever is more than these is from the evil one.” Here Jesus contradicts the explicit language of Numbers, warning people that if they follow literally what God said in Numbers regarding oaths, their words will be “from the evil one.”

Finally, “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ But I tell you not to resist an evil person. But whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also.” Here Jesus contradicts God's prescription for justice, a prescription that is stated three times in the Pentateuch. Jesus calls instead for radical mercy.

You might counter, Jesus was God. As God, he had the authority to contradict or supersede words God had previously spoken. But if we mere mortals dared to challenge God that would be blasphemy.

My response: Not always. Consider the story of Abraham.

Example two: Abraham and Sodom

God tells Abraham he is going to investigate Sodom and Gomorrah. The implication is that judgment (doom) is at hand. God does not ask Abraham for his opinion. God simply announces his intentions. Instead of bowing and agreeing, Abraham challenges God, accusing him of injustice.

“Surely you wouldn't do such a thing, destroying the righteous along with the wicked. Why, you would be treating the righteous and the wicked exactly the same! Surely you wouldn't do that! Should not the Judge of all the earth do what is right?” Genesis 18:24-25.

Abraham does not approach this conversation with God as a sycophantic courtier. He is not the president's lawyer inventing legal justification for “enhanced interrogation.” To press it further, Abraham does not respond to God with an “Oswald Chambers-like” submission. Abraham knows God has the power to do whatever he wants, but having the power does not automatically confer the right. For Abraham, God's overwhelming power does not confer indisputable authority. God must conform himself to justice.

God readily agreed to Abraham's conditions limiting God's freedom to act destructively against the cities, and when the investigating angels couldn't find even the ten righteous inhabitants specified by Abraham, God honored Abraham's scruples by evacuating Lot and his family before the fire fell (Genesis 18, 19).

We could appropriately argue that God intended Abraham to act the part of “savior” in this story. God announced an investigation, Abraham knowing the moral plight of the Sodomites, stepped in to plead for them. In this story, God was deliberately setting up Abraham as a type of the Savior. Interpreted this way the passage makes my point even more strongly: The mission of Christians is not to join God in his work of “investigating” and “condemning.” Our job is to join the God the Savior in advocating for mercy.

Example Three: Moses and the Idolatrous Israelites

The people of Israel were camped at Mt. Sinai. Moses was up on the mountain communing with God. After Moses had been on the mountain for weeks, the people began to fret. They wanted a visible god to lead them. So Aaron made a golden calf and the people began dancing around this idol in worship. God informed Moses of this problem and then gave him a direct order,

“Now leave me alone so my fierce anger can blaze against them, and I will destroy them. Then I will make you, Moses, into a great nation.” Exodus 32:10

In the case of Abraham and Sodom, Abraham challenged God. Here, Moses defies God. He countermands the very words of God. There is no hint of diffidence or ambiguity in God's command. Moses understands it perfectly. But instead of obeying and getting out of the way, Moses questions God's judgment. “God, I don't think you really want to do that. If you do it, you'll be sorry.” Later, Moses upped his protest. “I will not step aside. To kill them, you're going to have to go through me.”

God backed down.

Both Abraham and Moses are celebrated as righteous men. Their challenges to the very words of God are recognized as acts of righteousness. These leaders were honored by God for their obedience and also for their bold challenges.

Example four: Joshua and the Gibeonites

The people of Israel invaded Palestine. At Jericho, acting on orders from heaven, they annihilated every man, woman, child and animal—except Rahab and everyone in her hotel. After Jericho, the Israelites destroyed the city and people of Ai. Both of these savage exterminations were ordered explicitly by God. When tribal groups throughout Palestine heard the news, they formed a league to fight the invaders. The Gibeonites, however, tried a different tactic. They sent a delegation to ask for a peace treaty with the Israelites.

When the emissaries arrived, Joshua interrogated them. “Who are you? Where do you come from?”

The ambassadors answered, “Your servants have come from a very distant country. Stories of your exploits have reached even as far as our country. We've heard about what your God did to the Egyptians and to Hesbon and Bashon. We have come offer ourselves as vassals. We're prepared to pay tribute. We just want to be on your side. We want to connect with the God who is able to do what your God does.”

Joshua responded, “God has forbidden us to make treaties with any one in this area. How do we know you live far enough away for us to even consider making a treaty?”

The Gibeonites managed to convince Joshua and the elders that they did, in fact, live far away. Joshua and the elders agreed to a treaty. A few days later the Israelites discovered they'd been fooled. The Gibeonites lived only three days away from the Israelite camp. The Israelites were outraged. They marched to the region of Gibeon to annihilate these deceiving Canaanites.

Once in the Gibeonite neighborhood, however, Joshua restrained his army. “We gave our word,” he said. “When we make a promise, we keep it. Even to pagans. Even if they tricked us.”

The army was outraged at Joshua's refusal to exterminate these worthless people. They threatened mutiny, but Joshua was adamant. “Yes, they are Canaanites. Yes, they fooled us. Yes, they are on God's extermination list. Yes, God forbade us to make a treaty with people like this. But, no, we are not going to break our word. A treaty is a treaty. An oath is an oath.”

Joshua summoned the Gibeonite leaders. “Why did you deceive us, saying you lived a long way away?”

The Gibeonites answered, “Your servants had heard definite, detailed reports about the command your God gave you to wipe out all the inhabitants of the land. We've seen your God's power in Egypt and in the battles against Sihon, king of Hesbon, and Og, king of Bashon, and Jericho and Ai. We are helpless against you militarily. We did the only thing we could think of to save our lives. We are in your hands. Do to us whatever seems good and right.”

So Joshua saved them. He imposed severe “tribute.” They were consigned to serve as temple slaves in perpetuity. But they were alive.

God's command to wipe out the people of Canaan was so emphatic, so clear and unmistakable, the pagan people themselves had memorized it. There was nothing fuzzy in God's directions. God had ordered the Israelites to exterminate these wicked people. When Joshua saved the Gibeonites, he was countermanding the very words of God. Was he right to do so?

A few generations later, King Saul violated the treaty Joshua had made and tried to carry out God's command to exterminate the Gibeonites. During the reign of the next king, David, God sent a famine to punish Israel for Saul's effort to obey God's extermination decree. To atone for Saul's actions against the Gibeonites David executed seven of Saul's descendants. Only after this act of retribution against Saul's family did God revoke the famine decree. Whatever else we make of this story, it clearly demonstrates God's endorsement of Joshua's contravention of God's explicit command regarding the peoples of Canaan. Joshua, a type of Christ, disobeyed the divine command and saved the condemned people. Saul, a type of Satan, attempted to carry out God's verdict of condemnation. Is there any question about which of these leaders is a more appropriate model for leaders today? (For an example of the righteous breaking of an oath for destruction see the story of Jonathan and the honey in 1 Samuel 14.)

“Doing right is more important than obeying God.”

Of course, as believers, we would say this differently. We would say that doing right is the truest, purest interpretation of God's words. If obeying God's words leads someone to mistreat people, we would argue the perpetrator has misunderstood God, that God's words didn't really mean what they thought. But I put it the other way, because sometimes we are so sure we know what God meant by what he said, that our consciences are anesthetized. When American Adventists expressed support for the American use of torture during the Iraq war, they imagined they were merely showing respect for Paul's words about the ruler and his sword. The whole world could see that American practices of rendition and torture were evil, but some of my own church members thought they saw justification for these things in the Bible. When Charlie Fuqua, an Arkansas Republican, proposed legislation that would allow parents to seek the death penalty for an incorrigible child, he was attempting to be faithful to his understanding of the words of God recorded in the Bible.

These examples of people misusing the words of God show that it is not enough to ask, “What did God say?” Sometimes a better question is, “What is right?” Adventists are champions of God's Law. We see the divine law as an explication of eternal principles. The foundation for the law is so universal, so noble and exalted, God himself is not free to violate it. Obviously, if God is bound by the eternal law of love and justice, we mere mortals not free to violate it even if the Bible orders us to do so.

If our consciences—feeble and scarred as they are—warn us against an injustice, courageous leaders among God's people will join Abraham and speak up, even if there are words in Scripture which can be cited in support of the injustice. We will not allow traditional understandings of the explicit words of God to seduce or coerce us into complicity with institutional or societal injustice. We will refuse to be seduced into imagining that our cooperation with injustice is the will of God.

In the Bible, one criteria shows up repeatedly for countermanding the words of God: mercy. Abraham argued to save Sodom on that basis. Moses saved Israel from the understandable wrath of God. In the case of the Gibeonites, Joshua faced two contradictory, legally-binding claims: God's verdict of destruction and his own oath of protection. Certainly customary justice would privilege God's command over a human's oath. However, mercy triumphed, setting aside the very command of God.

Example five: Jesus and the Sidonian Woman

When the pagan woman from the neighborhood of Sidon asked for Jesus' help, he ignored her. When this did not dissuade her, Jesus announced that helping her would violate his God-given mission. Then Jesus compared her to a dog which meant the gospel was not to be preached to her (See Matthew 7:6). Jesus could hardly have been more explicit about her place outside God's favor. In face of this reiterated, explicit rejection citing God as the authority, the woman refused to yield. Instead of submitting to plain meaning of Jesus' words, the woman turned them back against him: even dogs get crumbs. Finally, Jesus capitulated. Jesus (God) bent to the insistence of this mother who demanded mercy for her tormented daughter. To dramatize the divine capitulation, Jesus said to the woman, “May it be for you as you wish.” (Not “as I wish.” Not “as God's wishes.” “As you wish!”)

We believe Jesus' words expressing exclusion were a dramatic set up for his eventual gracious response to this mother. We believe his initial rejection was only apparent. Its purpose was to demonstrate all the more powerfully the universality of the kingdom of heaven. God was speaking through the mother when she rejected the explicit words of Jesus and demanded mercy. Her words, not the initial words of Jesus, were the truest expression of the purpose of God. (Of course, Jesus was deliberately eliciting her words.) Which brings us back to the truth captured in Jesus' twice repeated quotation from Hosea: “You would not have condemned my innocent disciples if you knew the meaning of this Scripture: ‘I want you to show mercy, not offer sacrifices.'”

Some real-life applications

Occasionally, devout, conservative Christians talk to me about their quandary regarding their homosexual friends and children. They read the Bible's explicit condemnations of homosexual acts. On the other hand, they have a gut sense that our condemnation of all homosexual unions is wrong. They know the words of Romans 1 do not describe their homosexual friends. What to do? How can it be righteous to set aside the explicit words of the Bible to accommodate this virtually unalterable human condition? I point my devout, conservative friends to the story of Joshua and the Gibeonites. Yes, like Joshua's soldiers, we can quote words of God to justify condemning the class of people we call homosexuals. Or we can act like Joshua and put the full weight of our influence and leadership into protecting and welcoming these vulnerable people who seek sanctuary among us. Surely Joshua, a type of Christ, is a more righteous model for us than his soldiers.

When we ask if there are any words in the Bible that can be used to justify excluding people, we are acting like Jesus' disciples who wanted Jesus to send away the Sidonian mother. We are acting like Joshua's soldiers who wanted to be God's enforcers. The Bible is crystal clear that it was Joshua and Jesus who did right, not the soldiers and disciples. We are called to follow the example of Joshua and Jesus.

Our treatment of homosexuals cannot be separated from the lessons of Christian history in regard to slavery. The Bible explicitly condones and regulates slavery. For centuries, Christians used these words of the Bible to justify the status quo of slavery. We now know they were tragically wrong. No matter what Deuteronomy or Ephesians says about the legitimacy of slavery, Christians now decry its immorality. Even though there is no explicit warrant in the Bible for abolition, Christians now agree this non-biblical stance is right. What was explicitly allowed by the words of the Bible is now universally condemned as immoral.

Something similar has happened in regard to the death penalty. The Bible prescribes death by stoning for Sabbath-breakers, adulterers, rebellious sons, homosexual unions, women unable to prove their virginity at their wedding, blasphemers, witches, and rape victims if the rape occurred within the city limits. The people of God rightly judge any attempt to impose these Bible commandments in our day as barbaric and immoral.

We fail to cooperate with God when we use his words as weapons for defending the privileges of the privileged or as cudgels for keeping less-privileged people in their place. We partner with God when we use the Bible as an instrument of mercy or as a device for opening prison gates. In the synagogue at Nazareth, Jesus read Isaiah's words as his mission statement:

The Spirit of the LORD is upon Me,
Because He has anointed Me
To preach the gospel to the poor;
He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted,
To proclaim liberty to the captives
And recovery of sight to the blind,
To set at liberty those who are oppressed

To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD.

When the people fully realized what Jesus was saying, when they understood the full measure of his radical mercy, they rushed to throw him off a cliff. I pray we will not be equally offended by the radical mercy of God in our day. I pray that we will instead rush to join him in his mission, welcoming the unattractive, protecting the threatened. To reference another of Isaiah's prophecies (Isaiah 56), we are called to participate with God in providing sanctuary for even the eunuchs and aliens in God's house of prayer.

John McLarty is senior pastor of the Green Lake Church of Seventh-day Adventists in Seattle, Washington and author of Adventist Spirituality for Thinkers and Seekers published by Review and Herald.