Choose Love Not Power

Tony Campolo

Description

The God who set aside power in order to live out love--fully expressing that love on Calvary's tree--is at the core of the Christian message to the world. Yet in the centuries since Christ's refusal to yield to Satan's temptation to establish his kingdom through economic, political, and religious power, the Church has struggled to make the same refusal. In Choose Love Not Power, scholar, activist, and modern-day prophet Tony Campolo explores the relationship between love and power, beginning with an examination of Jesus' life and working toward a "theology of power" for Christians today. He surveys the implications of choosing love over power when it comes to the global community's most pressing issues--environmental degradation, economic inequality and instability, and perpetual war. Dr. Campolo suggests that the choice between love and power begins close to home: Christ-followers who choose love over power in marriage and in parenting will likewise opt for love in their churches, communities, and governments. The growing number of believers seeking a more authentically Christlike way to be Christian in a diverse, pluralistic society will be challenged and encouraged by this unflinching look at Jesus's example of love.

Sujets

• Philosophie et théologie

Informations

• Publié par: Baker Publishing Group
• Date de parution: 24 décembre 2009
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781441223746
• Langue: English

Extrait

© 2009 Tony Campolo
Published by Baker Books a division of Baker Publishing Group P.O. Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287 www.bakerbooks.com
Baker Books edition published 2014
ISBN 978-1-4412-2374-6
Previously published by Regal Books
First published as The Power Delusion by Victor Books in 1983.
Ebook edition originally created 2011
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version ®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.
Other versions used are:
KJV — King James Version. Authorized King James Version.
RSV —From the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright 1946, 1952, and 1971 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. Used by permission.
To Brook Gay: A gentle, kind and joyful friend
CONTENTS
Preface to the New Edition
1. Power Plays in the Peaceable Kingdom
2. Love and Power in the Family
3. Women with Power
4. When Children Get Power
5. Religious Power Plays
6. Holy Terrors
7. Glorious Authority
8. Rulers in the Upside-Down Kingdom
9. What to Do While We Wait for the Second Coming
10. The Sins of the Powerless
11. The Painful Cost of Conquering Love
12. When God Does His Stuff
13. Living Without Power
Some Concluding Words
Endnotes
Acknowledgments
PREFACE TO THE NEW EDITION

My book entitled The Power Delusion was first published in 1983—and a lot has happened since then. Many of the most important insights of the feminist movement were not yet available for Christian reflection. For instance, I did not really understand the importance of inclusive language back then, and failed to see that much of what I and others in the Christian community had said and written in those days gave women a sense of being left out. I have tried to do better in this new edition and, while I still talk about God as Father, I have become aware that in God’s character there is, for lack of a better term, a feminine side to God. Christian feminists have gained scholarly validation for their claim that in the Hebrew Bible (that is, the Old Testament), the word for God’s Spirit is feminine and that in the New Testament, the Greek noun referring to the Holy Spirit is gender-neutral. In short, I am one of those who have come to believe that God transcends culturally defined concepts of masculinity and femininity and encompasses the best socially defined traits of both sexes. Even after making such corrections, we must all be ready to acknowledge that God is infinitely more than we could ever hope or think.
Another reason for a thorough rewrite of this book is that since 1983, power struggles between racial groups have come to be more clearly understood. African-American Christians have taught Euro-American Christians like myself a great deal about how the power we have exercised against them, ever since the days of slavery, has both oppressed them and also diminished the humanity of we white people who have done the oppressing. No discussion of how “power games” are played out in our society would be complete without some reference to how these games have affected race relations in America.
A closer look at how power games have impacted family life is also needed. Psychologists have written extensively over these past decades about how families have been affected by attempts at domination and the craving for power, and we know more now about the creation and perpetuation of destructive states of codependency. Biblical scholars have helped us to explore in greater depth what the Scriptures have to say about love and power than was available back in the early 1980s, and these insights often concur with what social scientists tell us about what makes for healthy and unhealthy familial relationships.
But we have to be careful when synthesizing biblical truths with practices sometimes prescribed by social scientists. As a case in point, some forms of modern psychology may have actually encouraged the destructive exercise of power to the detriment of relationships, both within and outside the family. Philip Rieff, in his seminal book The Triumph of the Therapeutic , has claimed that the psychological theories of Sigmund Freud have provided the ideological basis for a form of “self-actualization” in which individuals are given permission to assert themselves and seek hedonistic personal gratification of their libido desires, even at the expense of others. 1
Before the work of Freud, Rieff argues, the clergy did most of the counseling. Under the auspices of religion, the clergy endeavored to carry on a “ministry of reconciliation.” Their aim was to help marriages work. They attempted to help parents and children come into harmonious relationships. And ultimately, they sought to nurture persons into a surrendered relationship with God.
After Freud, these former goals for counseling were sometimes replaced by encouraging individuals to become assertive in ways that would break the “chains of approval from others” and to live out their inner desires, regardless of what emotional costs others might have to pay as that individual strove to actualize the potentialities of the self. Fredrick Nietzsche would call such behavior “the will to power,” and it is essential for us to explore how contrary this is to sacrificial love that is at the core of Christianity.
Finally, biblical scholars and theologians, since 1983, have provided more in-depth analyses of how power and love work themselves out in the lives of Christians, especially as they seek ways to become more like Christ. There is little question that our failure to understand how power plays condition the ways Christians interact with each other within the Church, as well as the ways they impact our relationships with those outside the Church, has led to contemporary distortions of Christianity from what it was intended to be. It is my hope that what follows in this book will not only lead to a better grasp of how godly people should handle power in their various spheres of life, but also will provide some helpful insights as to what the Scriptures are trying to teach us about how to live out our faith in everyday life.
POWER PLAYS IN THE PEACEABLE KINGDOM
One day, after finishing my lectures at a downtown university, I was driving home on the Schuylkill Expressway in Philadelphia. I had just crossed City Line Avenue when I heard a “kerplunk” and knew I had a flat tire. I tried to pull my car over to the side of the road, but if you know anything about the Schuylkill Expressway, you know that the shoulder of that expressway is so inadequate that you really can’t get an automobile completely off the highway. I did the best I could.
I jacked up the car and began to change the tire—sweaty work on a fairly hot day. While I was doing all of this, I had the car radio turned on and blaring away. Over the airwaves came news from the “Go Patrol” helicopter that hovers over the city at rush hour, broadcasting to motorists the locations of traffic tie-ups. I heard the man from the Go Patrol announce, “Well, folks! They’re not going to get home tonight! They’re tied up on the Schuylkill Expressway all the way back to Montgomery Avenue. They’re standing still in both directions on City Line Avenue. It’s gridlock out there, people! Everything is standing still! Nothing is moving! The city of Philadelphia is coming to a standstill!”
As I heard this dire announcement, I thought to myself, What evil has befallen my fair city? What catastrophe has come upon the City of Brotherly Love?
Then the man on the radio said, “There’s a brown car just west of City Line Avenue …”
That’s my car! I realized with surprise. My car has the city of Philadelphia tied up! My car that has created the gridlock! I’m the one who’s created this catastrophe! I felt like crying out in anguish, “Children are crying for their parents! Lovers are not meeting! Business deals are falling through … and I AM MAKING IT HAPPEN!”
Power! Who can help but enjoy the thrill of it?
The problem is that power can corrupt. The Greek tragedian Euripides is credited with the observation that “whom the gods would destroy, they first make drunk with power.” And most of us remember Lord Acton’s contention that absolute power corrupts absolutely.
There are few things that prove more intoxicating than power, and Christians are not immune to being seduced into playing power games. There is an excitement that comes from controlling, dominating and affecting what goes on in other people’s lives.
Christians do not always take warnings about power seriously.
There are husbands who think it is their right to exercise power over their wives, and there are wives who, in subtle and not-so-subtle ways, play power games with their husbands.
There are children who try to exercise power as they challenge the controlling efforts of their parents, and there are parents who regularly tyrannize their children.
There are pastors who try to dominate their parishioners, and church members who try to manipulate their pastors.
There are employers who enjoy bossing their employees, and employees who form unions just so they can strike back and dictate policies to their employers.
There are white people who fear losing their power over African-Americans, and African-Americans who turn cries of “Freedom now!” into shouts of “Black power!”
There are politicians who compromise anything to stay