Tonight I am torn between continuing my reflections on the Apostles' Creed and regaling you with the story of Linda's garlic toast. Why not? I'll do both! Izzi came over to do her online homework, so Linda fixed dinner for one more, including her luscious garlic toast. Well, usually luscious. We were sitting at the table conversing and sharing our meal when suddenly Linda leapt to her feet and ran over to the stove. I turned around just in time to see smoke pouring out of the oven. She opened it up, reached inside and pulled out garlic toast flambé. Of course, it wasn't intended, but she sure looked funny frantically blowing on the flaming toast which then filled the kitchen with smoke. I'll have to get the smoke alarms tested. Like Sherlock Holmes questioning Watson about the curious matter of the dogs barking, they were strangely silent when they definitely should have sounded. Unfortunately, she was able to extinguish the fire before I could get a picture, but I do have Izzi as a witness.
Something very strange happens in the Creed after the mention of the virgin birth of Jesus. His entire life and ministry is passed over as if it never happened. There is no dearth of apocryphal gospels and fanciful accounts of the "hidden years" of Jesus, and we have the Biblical record of the Gospels that fill us in concerning the approximately three years of his public ministry, but all this is omitted in the Creed which jumps from the virgin birth to his suffering under Pontius Pilate. Since this creed is a recitation of that which was considered essential to Christian faith for the purposes of catechal teaching and baptism, the absence of any detail of Jesus' life is instructive. While not unimportant, by comparison with the assertion of Jesus divine origin safeguarded by the virgin birth and his sacrificial death at the hands of a Roman procurator, the ministry of Jesus definitely takes a back seat. It is his passion, death, and resurrection that provides the means of our salvation, not his ministry.
It is also important that our salvation is grounded in historical reality rather than mythical imagination. While there are mythic dimensions to our faith (mythic being understood as that which has universal application), our story has its roots in a definite time and place in history. It is not enough that we have eternal principles by which we live; it is in flesh and blood history that Jesus came, it is in flesh and blood history he works today, and it will be to flesh and blood history that he returns. We don't live by a set of rules or ideals, but by our allegiance to a Man who was born, lived, and died among people like Herod, Caesar Augustus, and Pontius Pilate. I am grateful tonight that my salvation is more than following certain principles, living out the seven habits of highly successful people, or working through the latest self-help book. Salvation is in the Name of Jesus Christ who didn't give us principles by which to order our lives, but gave us Life itself. And I'm thankful for the belly laugh I had tonight at Linda's expense.
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