Transactional Theology / Transformational Experience
“Transactional Theology / Transformational Experience”
Numbers 21:4-9 John 3:14-21
Fourth Sunday in Lent, Year B, March 14, 2021
First Presbyterian Church, Sandpoint, Idaho
Andy Kennaly, Pastor
One of my favorite religious sayings is that “the mission of God is to comfort the afflicted, and afflict the comfortable.” This is at the core of Christian belief, at least theoretically.
People pray for comfort, for pain lifted, for healing, to seek God’s favor. We tend to go out of our way to avoid struggles, and when life’s complications crash on us, it’s not uncommon to blame, complain, or criticize, even as we try and rally God on our side. Many people project unprocessed grief, fears, and pain onto others, which creates enemies or scapegoats. As Moses leads the ancient Hebrews in the wilderness, and they have issues. This archetypal pattern is on full display as they seek divine transactions. But deeper lessons involve transformation.
Moses and the people avoid their enemies, the Edomites, who did not give permission to cross their land, so they “go around the land of Edom,” but this takes them through the desert wilderness. Kind of like the Covid pandemic has exposed social problems that were already present but hidden, and now what’s brought out must be dealt with creatively; so too, in taking the long way around Edom, the Hebrew peoples’ attitudes of “avoidance and against” come out. That they “impatiently” speak “against God and against Moses” indicates the hidden fears of a self-referential perspective, as separate and superior egoic thinking creates discontent toward the very God who provides water from the rock and manna to eat. They now call the food “miserable” and they detest it. But then they experience a great set back, and their current level of consciousness is unable to deal with it. The limitations of their society are exposed.
I notice something about this passage, and it’s more an observation than an answer. One is, that it says God sends the poisonous serpents that bite the people. God sends these snakes. The people complain, God sends snakes that kill some people, and now the Israelites have a different outlook as they learn and grow in ways that this struggle has made possible. On the one hand, this seems coercive, God manipulates a certain outcome, like getting a desired confession by torturing someone. They’ll say anything, just make it stop!
On the other hand, in the extremes of a desert wilderness, a divided people bent on complaining set themselves up for hardship. It’s their attitudes that lead to death, they’ve already condemned themselves, and the snakes are symbolic of the relational toxicity they carry on the inside. Or maybe this is just the Old Testament’s way of saying that life is hard… and shows peoples’ inherent reactions to what life is like.
The people have and amazing change of heart. They’re humbled. Their confession shows they now know something has to change and it starts in their own hearts. They recognize their sin against Moses and God. And they, naturally, pray, or have Moses pray for them, that God takes away the snakes. “Ok, God, we’re humble now, cut us some slack!” But let’s notice: God does not answer their prayer in the way they want. God does not take away the snakes, and they still are biting people. But God does provide a way through the pain, a way to manage the sting of life, a way to remove the toxicity. Somehow, Moses forges a bronze snake and puts it on a pole and if the people look at it they are healed. What a story! Does this bronze thing have a power to heal? Not likely. They are healed from within as they trust God’s deliverance.
This story also illustrates the difference between a belief system based on transaction and spirituality grounded in transformation.
The importance of this subtlety is why this story is carried forward in John’s gospel. That theme of light coming into the world but people loving the darkness more revisits Moses, the people, and lifting the serpent on a pole. The ancient symbolism of a serpent representing Wisdom is not lost on us as the Son of Man is lifted on a pole, the cross.
These verses are very familiar to millions of people. John chapter three is quoted, mentioned, and verbalized, but how it’s expressed and heard depends on attitudes and assumptions. Is this passage transactional, assuming humanity is condemned, that we’re sinners needing to appease a God who insists on judgement, and through the cross we are saved, which usually means made right with God through an atoning sacrifice that only Jesus can give? This seems to be the shape of much of Western Christianity.
But this passage is also transformational, where love is freely given, delivering us from the pain and suffering of sin without any twinge of guilt or condemning. This is different than transaction, and God does not need appeasement, indeed, God is pleased in blessing the world through Christ.
A psychotherapist and spiritual retreat leader from Ireland, Patrick Boland, reminds us that “substitutionary atonement is the theory that Christ, by his own sacrificial choice, was punished in the place of us sinners, thus satisfying the ‘demands of justice’ so that God could forgive our sins.” He reminds us that, “This theory was developed within the norms and values of the eleventh century, when a medieval code of feudal honor and shame existed across much of Europe. In those years, Anselm of Canterbury wrote a paper stating that as a result of humanity’s sinful disobedience in the Garden of Eden, ‘A price did need to be paid to restore God’s honor.’ This idea was predicated on a theology where […] the focus was on the fall of Genesis 3 rather than our primal goodness of Genesis 1. Over the last millennium, this emphasis on the fallen nature of humanity and the need for God’s honor to be restored became the most widely accepted theory for why Jesus died.”
We call this “original sin” and “penal substitutionary atonement doctrine.” This is the driving, transactional belief guiding most American churches, and, as you can see, Christian fundamentalists would have made excellent eleventh century Catholics. Anselm and Nobility would be pleased.
Boland says, “I remember the day when I first realized the differing emphasis on atonement theory among Christians. I was in college when a friend started explaining the Gospel to me. He drew a diagram to point out the logic of [this] atonement theory. I remember his shock when I said, ‘That’s so interesting. It’s like the mechanics of why Jesus died. I’ve never heard that before.’ He asked me on what basis I called myself a Christian. I started talking about meaning, purpose, the notion that everything is spiritual, my love of Jesus’ teachings, and having a sense of connection with God. From the look on his face, I could tell he was concerned for my soul!”
Boland listened to his friend, and for many years his “worldview moved to one that was more transactional. Who’s in and who’s out? What do you believe and what don’t you believe?” He says, “My transformational experiences of spirituality were replaced by a transactional theology about God. I had more answers and – dare I say it? – a little less love.”
At some point the trajectory of his life changed, as did the quality of his relationships and respect for those who are different. He concludes, “In a world that desperately needs transformation and genuine spiritual connection among differing communities, we remain young and immature if we merely focus on how to get in.” (Everything Is Sacred: 40 Practices and Reflections on the Universal Christ, by Richard Rohr and Patrick Boland, Convergent Press, New York, 2021 by Center for Action and Contemplation, pgs. 135-139).
As John says, “Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him,” we see through the lens of Incarnational Christianity that God’s glory is about God’s Presence, the awareness to live in God’s Presence is a gift. As we read John’s words, it’s “not so much a Christ coming into the world as coming out of a world that is already soaked with Presence.” God is not “a problem-solving forgiver-of-sins-God, […] but a God whose greatness […] models poured-out-oneness for us.” (Rohr’s introduction, xii- xiii).
The subtlety of transactional theology and spiritual transformation is illustrated if we play with pronunciation. We can pronounce the the word atonement and assume it means to believe a certain way to appease God. To illustrate the Tranformational aspect of a spirituality that trusts inner experience and inherent goodness, that word, atonement, is pronounced, at-one-ment. Atonement emphasises separation bridged by Jesus. At-one-ment shows there is no separation, only love expressed by Jesus. This pulls out the guilt, the shame, the honor-code of midieval Europe’s fuedal system, or the purity codes of most religious systems, as At-one-ment focuses on unity, relationship, and Incarnation of Christ in and through all things.
But who are we to judge, to complain that others may not see things the way we do? What good does it do to point an accusing finger, or try to convince others in how wrong they are, why they should believe like we do?
Do we need a transactional God to help us notice we have a soul? Atonement seems to work well for the last 1,000 years, and many people are satisfied with this expression of doctrinal belief systems, a faith they hold dear and experiences that are valid. For others, at-one-ment, and transformation in broader, spiritual mysteries that embraces experiential faith is needed. Ancient expressions of original blessedness, lifted up by the desert fathers and mothers of the third and fourth centuries and mystics throughout the ages, invite participation as co-creators, in Christ.
This Lenten Season, we explore the cross, but even deeper, we become aware of what our frame of reference is. As we read scripture, we examine the lenses through which we look. How do we know what we know? What lesson is Life teaching us now? Self-awareness involves humility, often brought through struggle. The God who sends snakes, Son, and poles, gifts of wisdom, is always on our side. Live as children of light, and may God’s humble and vulnerable love be glorified, now, even as forever. Amen.