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| Open Theism Discussion Board > Public Forums > Theological Q&A > when a human being says "Yes" to God's grace | Forum Quick Jump
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 4/2/2004 6:30 PM (GMT -6) |   | quote:
http://beliefnet.com/story/7/story_747_2.html
QUOTE:
There is a constant debate between Protestants and Catholics regarding the "size" of Mary. Catholics tend toward picturing her as Co-Redemptress, an indispensable Mediatrix and an immaculately conceived human. Protestants react to such excess honor by diminishing her to a vessel used for the Incarnation. Recently, evangelical delegates to the General Synod of the Church of England insisted that the traditional text of the Nicene Creed be changed to reflect a subordinate role for Mary. They wanted to replace the traditional phrase of the Nicene Creed, "was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary," to "was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary," asserting that Mary had a lesser part in the miracle.
We Orthodox avoid this constant false dialectic. We believe the Virgin, conceived in a manner like us, possessed a fallen human nature that was given to Jesus Christ to save. At the same time we believe that her resounding "Let it be with me according to your word" linked our human race to the divine will and inaugurated our salvation. She is the daughter of Zion, the pinnacle of Israel's training under the law, and in her wake all nations are drawn to God. Jesus is our Savior, but she is the image of our salvation, the icon of what occurs when a human being says "Yes" to God's grace. Without her free assent and equal action there is no connection between the divine and human.
The sweet kiss is between Mother and Son. The Son freely expresses God's love toward humanity. The Mother freely expresses gratitude and love toward the Divine. At Christmas we proclaimed that Christ is Emmanuel, God himself with us. During this season of Theophany, let us remember that the Light dawned on us because a young woman, ever-blessed, said "Yes."
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 4/2/2004 6:32 PM (GMT -6) | | | | |
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benny
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Date Joined Mar 2004
Total Posts : 1
| Posted 4/2/2004 8:00 PM (GMT -6) | | As a 5 point Calvinist I rejoice in the fact that we can agree on the issue of the incarnation of our Lord. I think we as evangelicals would do well to realize that that is one of the fundamental issues in the Gospel. So many things flow from it (justification, imputation, transcendance/immanence, etc.).
It seems to me that the reactionary position that evangelicals have taken regarding Mary can very easily be detrimental to the fundamental issue of the incarnation, as you've pointed out.
I would gladly affirm everything you stated in your post, that is if you mean what I think you mean. So let me ask you a question. Are you refering to Mary in the same way that the judeo-christian tradition has refered to Abraham? If so, sign me up. Oh...of course I would take a bit of an issue with the term "free assent," but maybe we shouldn't get into that huh? | | Back to Top | | |
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Calvin_and_Hops
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Date Joined Apr 2004
Total Posts : 21
| Posted 4/3/2004 2:14 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by benny
Oh...of course I would take a bit of an issue with the term "free assent," but maybe we shouldn't get into that huh?
John Calvin put great emphasis on the theatre of God "woo-ing" us.
The MESS happened two generations later when the come-lately followers of a form of Calvinism and those who argued at Dortrecht (a generation after Arminus had died) pub43.ezboard.com/fthedialogueboxfrm19.showMessage?topicID=47.topic classed in ugliness. (I personally LIKE the pastoral guidance of the Canons of Dort--both to warn against trying to judge others, and to not dispair!) The result went too far. Continental Calvinists (Reformed) have a better take on what the Canons of Dort really say. And "TULIP" is a partially skewed take on what was not really meant, and in fact was denied with respect to the various lapsarianisms. (www.gty.org/~phil/articles/sup_infr.htm)
CALVIN'S view was that God was holding things together, and working with what there was...to his glorification BY his Glory (Power); not being the cause of evil. | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 4/3/2004 3:04 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by benny
Are you refering to Mary in the same way that the judeo-christian tradition has refered to Abraham? If so, sign me up. Oh...of course I would take a bit of an issue with the term "free assent," but maybe we shouldn't get into that huh?
Hm.... Thanks for your thoughts, Benny. Let me respond to the last two.
1. Your last--my first: That Mary responded "freely" does not mean that she did so outside of God's influence. Her very breathing, metastasizing, even existing. The "Calvist/Arminian" debate, with all its politicizing refractions should be put on the shelf when looking at something that happened fifteen-hundred years earlier. This is not political, its ontological.
"FREE" means unchained by sin. Original sin brought death, which brought (By our choosing: Admit it we must, that even when enslaved we STILL know what we are doing--unless we are totally debased like Pharoah.) more sin, death, sin, etc. Even my son remarks about how (an other kid--not him) fear of failing a test could lead (by a choice made in weakness) to cheating. "Fallenness/mortality" leads to our own sins. We inherit the infection and immitate the actions of Adam and Eve. But FREE means that someone is not swayed by the parasitical infection of sin. (Think of sin like a virus--it has no life of its own--its a parasite.)
Mary was neither coerced by God, nor influenced by Sin to make a decision based on trying to avoid death-leading consequences. MARY JUST LOVED GOD. Her "yes" was "unto me according to your will." And that phrase echoed in the blessing of Simeon at the Temple nine months later! ("Lord, now let thy servant depart in peace, having seen...") Mary was born in sins (pl.) just like David in Psalms 51; but that does not mean that she had to commit her own sins. She was born "with original sin" (The RCC idea of an "immaculate conception" is wrong.) but loved God.
Back to Calvin. The "wooing" (Thanks C&H.) of Mary was not a sales job. The wooing was in her whole growing up. (Remember what her extended family did for a living--Elizabeth's husband.) Zacharias went TO the Temple; Mary BECAME the temple of the living God, the Creator of heaven and earth! God sent Gabriel to ask Mary, and Mary gave an uncoersed response.
How can this be. And how can a "Calvinist" accept it. Welllllll........
Calvinists are BIG on a triplet that goes "Creation, Fall, Redemption." (The Canons of Dort instead BEGIN with sin. And the Heidelberg Confession, while covering Creation in Q&A1--"What is your only comfort in life and in death...That I am not my own but belong body and soul to my faithful Savior...not a hair will fall from my head..." and follows the outline 'Sin, Salvation and Serice/Gratitude.' I really like Q&A6, though, because the CREATION is part of it. Look it up: www.crcna.org/crbe/crbe_conf_hc_003-011.htm "God created them good and in his own image, that is, in true righteousness and holiness, so that they might truly know God their creator, love him with all their heart, and live with him in eternal happiness for his praise and glory.") Mary, and ALL humanity was CREATED good.
Some Reformed friends of mine, in their Catechism class, take a huge paper doll and write all the good things the Bible says about how we are created. THEN they crumple it up and un-crumple it, showing that it is still a paper doll, AND that it is crumpled. Everything is hard to read. But it is all still there!
With the fall we inherit the infection of the fall. And we inherit guilt even from our own parents, and from out own kids. (Corporate guilt is not just "ancestral.") But while "SINFUL" in sinful-nature is an adjective, the noun is "NATURE." Our nature remains what God made it to be. But the good nature is "crumpled up" (figuratively) in that the good things it is created for are influenced--even with our own complicity and bad decisions--in creating more sin, and through that more death, sin, etc.
Mary FREELY said "Yes." The Gospel of Luke is clear on that.
There was no pause in the universe as to what Mary's answer would be. Without coercing it, the Father knew Mary's heart. Mary could only say "no" if she did so out of a completely 'UN-natural' urge--from selfish-ness. But CREATIONALLY (a good Reformed-Calvinist term) Mary acted out of the first-cause of her Creation. Responding as a mirror to the light Mary said "YES" to her Creator. She became the "burning bush" and the "pillar of fire" (in poetic hymn language) as the one in her womb was the creator of everything and all space. Etc.
Mary is the first Christian. She had Christ both in her heart (She gave her "decision" that day.) and her womb.
And God was created in her the same way that we are born again with God created in us.
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2. As to "refering to Mary in the same way that the judeo-christian tradition has refered to Abraham", I don't know what you mean. My problem with "covenant theology" is that it seems to draw a continuum in linear time; while the gospel also has some backwards-working. For instance, the "First Adam" is actually modeled after the design of the "Second Adam." The Gospel crashes into time. (I'm neither a Cov.Th. nor an "Open.") | | Back to Top | | |
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 4/3/2004 3:11 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by PotOnWheel
beliefnet.com/story/7/story_747_2.html
QUOTE: . . .At the same time we believe that her resounding "Let it be with me according to your word"
quote:
...the liturgy commemorating the Annunciation (and found in Festal Menaion translated from the original Greek by Mother Mary and Archimandrite Kallistos Ware, - London: Faber and Faber, 1969) can be given here:
"To her the great Archangel came, saying to her: Hail, O thou who art full of divine grace, our God is now with thee (Luke 1, 28). Be not afraid of me, the chief commander of the armies of the King. For thou hast found the grace that thy mother Eve once lost: and thou shalt conceive and bring forth Him Who is one in essence with the Father."
"In the 6th month the chief of the angelic hosts was sent to thee, pure Virgin, to declare unto thee the word of salvation and to greet thee saying: 'Hail thou who art full of grace: the Lord is with thee. Thou shalt bring forth a Son, begotten before the ages from the Father, and He shall save His people from their sins.'" (Small Vespers)
"The angel Gabriel was sent from heaven by God to the city of Nazareth in Galilee to an undefiled Virgin, to bring her glad tidings of the strange manner of her conceiving. The bodiless servant was sent to the Living City and the Spiritual Gate, to make known to her the condescension and the coming of the Master. The captain of heaven was sent to the Living Pavilion of the Glory, to make ready an everlasting Dwelling for the Maker. And coming before her he cried: 'Hail, fiery throne, more glorious by far than the living creatures with four faces (Ezechiel 1. 5-6) Hail, thou Seat of the King of Heaven, hail uncut mountain (Daniel 2. 34-35) and precious vessel. For in thee the whole fullness of the Godhead has come to dwell bodily, by the good pleasure of the everlasting Father, and by the joint operation of the Holy Spirit. Hail, thou who art full of grace: the Lord is with thee.'" (Great Compline)
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 4/3/2004 3:23 AM (GMT -6) | | Benny, returning to your possitive response -- THANKS.
I wish to emphasize this agreed area: That the incarnation is often muddled, and that its Gospel message is central to our salvation.
quote:
Benny (reordered): So many things -- fundamental issues in the Gospel -- flow from the incarnation of our Lord.
The significant matter in the incarnation is the incarnation itself. It was completely NOT UNNATURAL for humanity to be joined to God's divine nature. (Not mixed, not confused, etc., in an "assymmetrical" joining that maybe is better said: 'held so closely' so as to be His own, being his own hypostasis, enhypostasized.)
The incarnation is humanity at its most human!
Like the Heidelberg Confession says:
quote:
God created them good and in his own image,
that is, in true righteousness and holiness,
so that they might
truly know God their creator,
love him with all their heart,
and live with him in eternal happiness
for his praise and glory.
We ARE created for fellowship!
Mary's YES proceeded out of this "Creational-Norm" (using Reformed-worldview-speak).
.............
(Calvin did not envision the world to be determined by God, but to be interacted with; and the fallen human soul "woo-ed." Mary did not need woo-ing: She loved the Lord!)
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PhilTheThrill
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Date Joined Jan 2004
Total Posts : 95
| Posted 4/12/2004 11:19 AM (GMT -6) | | I dont have a very strong opinion about Mary one way or the other, but my question is this:
Why does she not feature very prominently in the Bible?
Yes, she birthed Jesus, yes she was at the cross, but other than various narrative accounts about her in the gospels and acts, why is she not mentioned in the rest of the Bible? Not once does her name appear anywhere besides the Gospels and Acts.
If she's so important or worth worrying about, why isn't she mentioned by Peter, Paul, John, etc? Shouldn't she get a little more face time if she's such a crucial figure?
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PotOnWheel
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Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 4/13/2004 6:41 AM (GMT -6) | | PhilTheThrill: Why does she not feature very prominently in the Bible?"
PoW: Mary is very prominent. She is one of only a few who stayed at the foot of the Cross while her son died. I bet you have thought of that before. Wow. Peter, James, Andrew, all...run scared and thinking of themselves. And ther is Mary and John. You know what Jesus said to the two of them. Wow.
And Mary's own words "All people's shall call me blessed," and Gabriel's words "Hail highly favored one" are not unprominent.
Mary's Magnificat is modeled--hope you know--on Hannah's words when she conceived Samuel. Mary knew what she was saying, and knew that her son would beth be the savior, and die (the elderly folk at the temple told her about "a sword piercing her heart"). She was a mother of "Bibilical proportions!"
She is there when Jesus' ministry is just about to begin, and with faith she says "Do whatever he tells you to do."
She is not in much of Acts. But letters within the church show that she was "highly favored." (Polycarp?)
And PhilTheThrill asks: "..why is she not mentioned in the rest of the Bible?
PoW: Well, that asks me to guess. Doesn't it. And I like to only make little guesses. My little guess is that her "supporting role" in the Scriptures (Mentioned in Ezekiel, and also in Genesis: "crush the serpants head.") is the same reason that theologically the place of Mary is not the center of anything. Mary is important to the extent that she is involved with Christ. (Which BTW is HUGE.) And "Mariology" in Eastern Orthodoxy at least, is a sub-set of Christiology. So there are really only two things about Mary that Are Dogma. That she is "Theotokos" which means that she bore God. And that is important because it is a statement ABOUT CHRIST! Christ is fully human; and without that could not save us. And the second thing is that Mary is "evervirgin" which means for Christ that he was not born of a human father. Again, this is indespensible to salvation. Ther Birgin Mary is the mother of Christ, who had no father, who is the Eternal Son of the Father, who as God does not have a (divine) Mother.
That's enough.
Everything else is not dogma.
That Mary was the first Christian goes to a couple of things: That she hear the news first goes without quesiton. That she accepted Jesus into her heart, without reservation, is part of the Gospel narritive. That she exemplifies faith, both in her "Yes" to the angel and in her instructions to obey Christ is also Gospel. That she stayed at the cross, and suffered in her motherhood also reads plainly. That she was part of the Church at its birth is recorded; while she had her own "pentacost" when the Spirit overshaddowed her at Christ's conception.
But that she had a ministry of intercession within the Church...that is tradition. (But I have not reason to doubt it. If anyone was close to Christ, it was his mother.)
OK. "Not much." Maybe, but maybe that's enough.
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PotOnWheel
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Total Posts : 9890
| Posted 4/13/2004 7:16 AM (GMT -6) | | | | |
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