“John Wesley didn’t like using the word ‘persons’ of the Trinity.  One reason that’s not [helpful], it’s historic and all, but it’s very difficult for us to think of persons without thinking of individuals.  When I say ‘person’ we’re thinking about a detached individual.  You’re not really a person in our culture if you’re completely linked up, submerged in, another person.  Most of our education is an attempt to find who you are in your singularity and identity.” – Will Willimon

Amen.  This is why I believe in the Oneness critique of the doctrine of the Trinity.  We hold to a God who is three-in-one, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, but we do not believe that it is helpful or right, indeed false, to speak of them in any way that tends to sound polytheistic or makes the Godhead into a team or a committee.  As I understand it, the original word used in describing the Trinitarian model was the Latin persona, signifying the mask of an actor.  Now that makes sense to me and seems like a helpful metaphor, that God is playing multiple roles in His revealed story.  However, the word person today no longer has that meaning and no one even thinks of it even remotely in that way at all.  We think of persons as individual beings with unique personalities but the Bible tells us that God is one being and that He has one personality.

“‘Where was God when my son died?’ the man asked the preacher.  ‘Well probably where God was when His Son lost His life.’”

“When I experience my losses and my tragedies I gotta put those in the context of a God who is willing to embrace loss and tragedy and death in order to get us.  And I don’t know how in my own life exactly to embrace tragedy and pain but I’m pleading for an active, resourceful God here.”

“I’ve been led to believe that it is a horrible injustice that I’ve been made out of dirt and that I am returning to dirt…quickly.  That seems so unfair to me, and yet, our story says that not’s unjust, God didn’t make you to be an angel, God made you to be this.”

“This is a God that is determined to have a family and a people.  Now I quibble with His choices of people but Jesus had problems with that from day one, the kind of people that He loved to hang out with.”

“Isn’t it interesting that the poor, the dispossessed, the disenfranchised the Holy Spirit tends to find a home among them most frequently?  Because I’ve got a pretty good situation for myself and my children.  We’re well-fed, well-housed, well-futured.  And if the Holy Spirit came into my life, it’d only make my life more difficult.  So I have my ways for keeping the Holy Spirit at bay, one of them being my faith, my religion.”

“I don’t believe in Judeo-Christianity.  I’ve never met a Judeo-Christian.  I’ve met Jews, and I’ve met Christians, but I’ve never met Judeo-Christians.”

“These abstraction and generalizations we have found unhelpful.  It occurred to me that the minute you start abstracting and come up with ‘all-powerful’–that is probably a better commentary on us and our need than on the God who meets us in Jesus Christ because I define all-powerful as being able to do what I want to do, when I want to do it, and the way I want to do it.  In other words, when I talk about God I tend to talk about the way God would be if I were God and that’s all-powerful.  What do you with a God that defines all-powerful as being powerful enough to do on a cross as a victim of capital punishment?  That’s a re-definition of power, isn’t it?”

“I’m uncomfortable with you talking about ambiguity…as long as ambiguity is not an excuse for me not to worship [God]…  There is no ambiguity that God came in the flesh as a Jew from Nazareth who lived briefly and died violently and rose unexpectedly.”

“You can usually detect the ethical substance of a theology by how much it talks about God and how little it talks about Jesus.’ (quoting John Howard Yoder).   We have billboards all over our cities saying, ‘In God We Trust.’  Which I think is odd given that we are paying a billion dollars every two weeks to the US Army.  I’d say we got our trust there.  They never put down, ‘In Jesus We Trust.’ or say ‘we’ll just have to accept this as Jesus’s will.’  We don’t do that.  It’s hard to drag Jesus into our projects with some of these odd ideas about enemies, but as Christians we’re supposed to do that.”
“Wesley started something that the world had never heard of before, Sunday School.  They taught kids how to study their Bibles.  There were all kinds of poor kids who couldn’t even read, and so they taught them how to read so they could study the Bible.  The question is today, what problems or situations exist for children which needs ministered to?”  [Latch key kids].  “Yes.  Some retired teachers at a church started an after school program for kids whose parents are still at work…”

“The test of the religion of the heart is religion of the hands. How we not only believe in Christ but how we practically follow Christ.”

“Isn’t it comforting that God has promised us that He will never allow anything happen to us… that is worse than what He allowed to happen to His own Son?…We follow a crucified Lord and Savior.”

“We make a commitment to Christ.  Fine, but that commitment is based on Christ’s prior commitment to us.  And we don’t make just one commitment.  As many of you can testify, you’ve been Christians for a long time and it’s like everyday Christ expects you to renew your commitment to Him.”

“Baptism is a sign of salvation.  It is a sign of all that Jesus does to save us.  Baptism you can’t do to yourself, it has to be done to you, just like your salvation.”

“The way to tell the difference between the true God and false gods is this: false gods will never shock you.” (i.e. they will look like the gods you want them to be and not demand things of you)

Think about that.