Many of us only think about God and our faith come Sunday when we pray, praise God, hear the Word then say good bye as we go back to the rest of our mundane life. But what if the mundane was revealed to be glorious?
Hi, my name is Terence, and I’m your host for Reading and Readers, a podcast where I review Christian books for you. Today, I review “The Rest of Life: Rest, Play, Eating, Studying, Sex from a Kingdom Perspective” by Ben Witherington III. One hundred sixty-eight pages — but it feels like a lot more — published by Eerdmans in November 2012. Available on Amazon Kindle for USD 10.99 and Logos for USD 20.89, but I got it for USD 3.99 because it was a deeply discounted book for October.
Ben Witherington III is a professor of the New Testament at Asbury Theological Seminary. I know him from his wonderful socio-rhetorical commentary series. He has written over 60 books, including historical fiction I enjoyed, “A Week in the Life of Corinth”. Whether it’s his commentary or his lighter works, I like how he immerses the reader into the New Testament world.
In today’s book, he does not bring us into the New Testament past. Instead, he connects our present, where we are in time and space, to the glorious future that awaits all believers.
I’ll let Witherington introduce you to the series and the book.
In this little series of Kingdom reflection studies we have already covered the Kingdom itself in Imminent Domain, worship from a Kingdom perspective in We Have Seen His Glory, money and material possessions in Jesus and Money, and most recently work from a Kingdom perspective in Work. But what about the rest of the normal life of a Christian? The concern of this series has been with the normal weekly events in the normal Christian life—work, rest, play, worship, spending, study, eating, relating. The thing that has struck me in doing this series is (1) how little serious theological and ethical reflection has been given to what some might call mundane existence, and (2) how even less consideration has been given to the interrelationship of these normal weekly Christian activities.
After finishing the book, I realised the title has a double meaning. “The Rest of Life” refers to the remaining activities while we yet live and breathe. But ‘Life’ here also points to eternal life, the age to come. Thus, reflecting on the rest of life means taking an eternal perspective.
To make this point, Witherington quotes 1 Corinthians 7:29-31. Let me read it to you.
What I mean, brothers and sisters, is that the time has been shortened. From now on those who have wives should live as if they did not; those who mourn, as if they did not; those who are happy, as if they were not; those who buy something, as if it were not theirs to keep; those who use the things of the world, as if not engrossed in them. For this world in its present form is passing away.
This tension of living in the Kingdom present now and not yet is key to the Christian life. Witherington rightly emphasises:
It is not the job of the church to baptize the status quo of “normal life” and call it good. It is not our job to merely hallow the ordinary. It is our task to follow Paul and other New Testament writers, and have an extraordinary perspective on the ordinary—a Kingdom perspective.
So get ready for an extraordinary perspective on your ordinary life.
Table of Contents
Rest
Let’s start by talking about rest. Specifically, Sabbath rest.
A few years ago, I was teaching a class on the Baptist Faith and Message. Then a long time Christian asked, “Why does the article say the Lord’s Day and not the Sabbath?” My answer was, “Christians don’t honour the Sabbath as the Jews do. We celebrate Sundays because it is the Lord’s Day, after Easter Sunday.”
She asked, “Since when?”
I didn’t have a good answer for her until now. According to Witherington. I quote:
Justin Martyr is quite clear—we observe Sunday because not only is it the day God began to create the world, it is the day Jesus rose from the dead (First Apology 67). But even clearer and earlier is the pronouncement of Ignatius of Antioch to the Magnesians: “Those who were brought up in the ancient order of things have come to the possession of a new hope, no longer observing the Sabbath, but living in the observance of the Lord’s Day, on which our life has sprung up again by Him and by His death” (Mag. 9:1).
You probably have decided what “Keeping the Sabbath Holy” means. As far as you are concerned, it’s a settled matter to be decided by one’s church or the individual. You don’t even realise there is still some fight in the issue.
If you want to make your mark in the boxing world, you find and beat the biggest, meanest boxer of them all. And in a Sabbatarian fight, Witherington picked S. K. Tonstad to a contest.
S. K. Tonstad is the author of “The Lost Meaning of the Seventh Day”. Tonstad is a Seventh-Day Adventist. The Sabbath is everything to them. So, who better to grapple with on the Sabbath rest than someone whose faith centres on it?
Would Witherington vs Tonstad be more exciting than Mike Tyson vs Jake Paul?
Well, just like the Tyson fight, it is one-sided. That’s because we are only seeing Witherington’s punches connect. And I’m ambivalent about the whole discussion because I think it’s a foregone conclusion. But it’s comforting to have Witherington explain why Christians do not practise the Sabbath as prescribed in the Old Testament. If you ever wonder why, have a read.
There is more to rest than the Sabbath.
Let me read an excerpt from Witherington’s chapter summary. Since it is a summary, he has already substantiated his points early on.
Listen to this:
Christians are not called to, nor required to, follow the retrospective approach of sabbatarianism when it comes to the issue of rest and sleep and restoration. We live out of the new creation and Kingdom that is coming, not out of the old creation and form of this world that is passing away. We are no longer under the Mosaic provisions; rather we are new covenant people looking forward to the Day of the Lord, and celebrating the first Lord’s Day, the Day of resurrection. We live betwixt and between, as the Kingdom has already come and is yet to come. How this affects our theology of rest and restoration is that we still need rest and restoration, but this does not require keeping Sabbath. What it requires is rest and restoration every single day, and it requires a good balance in the normal Christian life between work and rest, and play, and a myriad of other activities.
We have made pertinent Christian distinctions not only between Sabbath and rest, but also between rest and sleep. God neither slumbers nor sleeps, but we do. God, however, has a rest, and the author of Hebrews calls us to enter that eschatological rest of God—not as a resting place or resting time, but as a state of being, living by faith, with the peace of Christ in our hearts, looking forward without anxiety about the future, because the future is as bright as God’s promises and dawning Kingdom.
Worship as defined by Jesus is not about sacred space or times or days but about worship in spirit and truth, whenever and wherever; for every day, in the proper sense, is the Lord’s day, and the wall of partition between the sacred and secular has been broken down by the death and resurrection of Jesus. All of life is to be hallowed, all of our activities should be doxological—done to the glory of God and for the edification of others. This means as well that our resting time is also sacred time. It is something God gives his loved ones—who need their rest.
There is a lot to unpack on what he says there. I really think that the big picture view of rest is meaningful and helpful in a society that does not know what rest is and does not know how to rest.
Play
The second chapter is on play. Actually, I decided to read this book because I wanted to know what a theologian thinks of play.
I grew up playing games. Whether it’s console or PC, Nintendo or Playstation, board games or card games. I called myself a gamer, and I still play games today. Is there something Christian to be said of a past time that consumes so many people today?
Then I read this:
When Christians lose their ability to play, their desire to play, their interest in playing, they are moving away from, rather than toward, “turning and becoming as a child” so they may inherit the kingdom of God. In other words, from a Christian point of view, turning away from play as if it were frivolous, as if it were something adults should leave behind, is itself a sign of immaturity and reflects a lack of Christian wisdom.
Wow. Finally, something theological for the gaming teenager to stop the mouths of his youth pastor and overbearing parents.
Here is how the teenager can bring this chapter on play to make a point to his parents.
“Mom, Dad, I found this article that really encouraged my faith and I just want to share this with you. It says here, ‘… from a Christian point of view, turning away from play as if it were frivolous, as if it were something adults should leave behind, is itself a sign of immaturity and reflects a lack of Christian wisdom.’ I will just let you all ponder on that gem of wisdom while I go back to my room, put on my headphones and game with my friends.”
Then the parents say, “Hold on there, Junior. Who wrote that? Some random weirdo you met online. You best not hang around him, or else you gonna get brainwashed by him.”
“I don’t think he is a weirdo. He is Ben Witherington III, professor of New Testament at Asbury Theological Seminary.”
“Asbury Theological Seminary? Isn’t that the place that had that revival in February last year?”
“Yup, that’s the one.”
Now, while your parents are shocked about what to make of your new-found enthusiasm in theological commentaries, you should say this:
“Mom, Dad, I also found Professor Witherington’s take on Jurgen Moltmann’s to be quite profound.”
“Jurgen, who?”
“Jurgen Moltmann, the professor of systematic theology who wrote ‘The Theology of Hope’. Let me quote Witherington here:”
Play can be seen as an eschatological activity as well as a childlike one. Jürgen Moltmann, for example, stresses that in playing we anticipate our liberation, a time when we study war no more, a time when we shed all those things that inhibit us and alienate us from real life. Play foreshadows the joy of the eschaton where all manner of drudgery and disease and decay and death will be left behind. Play is quite rightly seen as a celebration of life lived to its fullest, its fastest, its highest, its limits. And play is something that has some potential to unite us, if done well and wisely. The Olympic vision and spirit of its games reflect this to a small degree. In any case, I think Moltmann is right that games, played well and fairly, fuel a theology of hope for the future. Playing is not a useless activity. It anticipates the joy of the eschaton.
“So, Mom, Dad, playing is not a useless activity. Professor Witherington and Professor Moltmann both say so.”
It would be awesome if this book, this chapter, was responsible for a revival among gaming teenagers. However, their hopes of being left alone to game all day and all night are dashed when their parents do what every vigilant Christian does: They read the quoted passage in context.
They realised that whenever Witherington speaks of play, he uses sports as an example. When he says playing is not a useless activity, he is defending his own obsession with baseball.
But can his Kingdom perspective on play apply to electronic games? What problems do parents and youth pastors have with electronic games?
I can think of three: sex, violence and addiction.
Sex and violence are not exclusive to games. Sex is rampant in movies and the Internet. As for violence, I don’t know what Witherington thinks of boxing. Would he consider boxing as part of play? Or does his analysis on play only cover the idyllic past time of baseball?
As for addiction, what is addiction? It’s greed, isn’t it? The sense of wanting more and never having enough. Greed got me thinking about the seven deadly sins, and I looked back at the topics in this book and saw a pattern!
When rest is corrupted, we get sloth. Play, greed. Eating, gluttony. Sex, lust. Studying? Makes people big headed, so pride.
Isn’t it fascinating that these activities are things we consider to be the mundane part of life? It is as Witherington said, not given much attention by theologians. But it is the mundane that gives the opportunity to sin.
But it doesn’t have to be that way, as Witherington goes on to show.
The Rest
We have looked at the book’s first two chapters, on rest and play. On the other three topics, I’ll share a favourite quotation on each.
On Eating.
It is sad but true that people eat because of disappointments, they eat because they think no one loves them, they eat because they have ceased caring about what they look like, they eat because they don’t get any sex. But eating was not intended to serve the purpose of a therapist or a mate or a doctor.
On Studying.
I have, in the last decade or so, spent a lot of time exhorting my seminary students to please commit themselves to lifelong learning. I’ve used all the best rhetoric to hand, stressed the importance of this, made required reading in my courses a minimum for passing the course to get them jump-started, and still many of them will not do much reading. As it turns out, much too much of the computer generation doesn’t want to read, unless it’s soundbites and McNuggets in the form of Facebook posts, tweets, and the occasional article online. Sadly, many of them don’t trust information they can’t find online, when it ought to be the other way around. There is a reason much of the free stuff online is free.
On Sex.
Lots of times we hear people say “we’re in love,” but in fact what is meant is “we’re in heat.”
That was a short one so here is another:
Russ Reno explains that the idolater has much in common with the adulterer—who wants sexual union but not children. “The idolater is like a man who visits prostitutes; he wants the pleasure without the responsibility—just as the idolater wants to worship but reserve the power to live as he pleases.” Just as a man who has an illicit relationship hopes she will keep quiet, so the idolater is not all that disappointed if his god is silent—for to hear from God would be rather inconvenient.
Criticism
Before I conclude this book review, let me offer one critique. I debated with myself whether it was a disagreement or a valid criticism; I will let you be the judge.
In chapter five, on the topic of Sex, Witherington engages with Rob Bell, the author of “Sex God”. There are parts here that were weak compared to the overall book. First, Witherington quotes Bell:
Bell also explores the love of God for us, focusing on how God grieves, has heartaches, and is pained—and as it says in Genesis 6, regrets having made humans. One of the more helpful and profound insights is that love is a giving away of power, a becoming vulnerable. Is that true of God as well? Bell says yes—look at Jesus. He adds: “Love is giving up control. It’s surrendering the desire to control the other person. The two—love and controlling power over the other person—are mutually exclusive. If we are serious about loving someone, we have to surrender all the desires within us to manipulate the relationship.”
There are two very striking implications to this: (1) If what Bell says is true, then love is never a power move, never irresistible, even when we are talking about God. That pretty much rules out certain Calvinistic views of love and God right there.
Let’s analyse this passage from the bottom up. The concluding statement is, “Certain Calvinistic views of love and God are not true.”
What premise leads to that conclusion? “Love is a giving away of power, a becoming vulnerable.” Quoting Bell, “Love and controlling power are mutually exclusive.” We are told to look at Jesus.
My response.
First, Witherington assumes the reader knows what Calvinism is — which is fine since the book is aimed at the more theologically inclined — but he leaves us to figure out which Calvinistic view he thinks is not true. Is it irresistible grace? Is it all of TULIP? Unlike his disagreements with Tonstad on Sabbath rest, it’s unclear what he disagrees with in Calvinism.
Second, Witherington bases his conclusion by reflecting on a chapter in Rob Bell’s book. I haven’t read a chapter about this, but I’m certain that it is not about the finer points of Calvinism.
Third, “Love and controlling power are mutually exclusive” smells like a false dichotomy. The argument is too simplistic and fails to remind readers that God is also sovereign.
I will follow the advice given, which is: look at Jesus.
When Saul was on his way to Damascus, Jesus struck him blind. After that dramatic scare and subsequent miracle healing, Saul was forever changed.
If you were cynical, you would say that God, Jesus, was manipulative, even abusive, for he used his power to control Saul. But if you are a Christian, you would respond as Paul did; it was all grace. I think Paul would say, “Love and controlling power are not mutually exclusive.”
For similar reasons, I find Witherington’s take on egalitarianism weak. To put it plainly, complementarianism believes women cannot be pastors because the two genders have different complementary roles. Egalitarianism believes women can be pastors because the new Christian order has abandoned the old patriarchal ways.
I would love to know why Witherington believes egalitarianism is correct. But he can’t because the chapter is not about egalitarianism. These are his thoughts after reading Rob Bell’s book.
Conclusion
In conclusion, we need more theological reflections on the rest of life: Rest, Play, Eating, Studying, Sex, watching Movies, Cooking, Cleaning, Exercising, and everything else we do between now and the Second Coming of Jesus Christ.
Just look at Netflix. You have shows on cleaning, fixing old cars, any activity can be made in reality TV. So I think it’s possible for us to have a theological reflections on every manner of activities.
And today’s book offers us a start towards an extraordinary perspective on our ordinary life.
This is a Reading and Reader’s review of “The Rest of Life: Rest, Play, Eating, Studying, Sex from a Kingdom Perspective” by Ben Witherington III. For more book reviews, subscribe to this podcast or visit the website, www.readingandreaders.com. With one click of a button, you can support me on my one-man mission to get people to read more good books. Thanks for listening. Bye bye.